The Sky Is Falling! [Turnstile]

Long-time readers of this column will recall that the proliferation of space debris in near-Earth orbits is an issue that I have expressed concern about before. Last May, the inevitable happened when “a piece of space debris too small to be tracked has hit and damaged part of the International Space Station—namely, the Canadarm2 robotic arm” [1] . The object punctured the thermal blanket and damaged the boom underneath, but, fortunately, the instrument is still operational [1] .