That, right there, is a crack in one of the windows of the International Space Station.
What caused it? Nothing more unassuming or harmless than a fleck of paint. Or a piece of metal one thousandth of a millimeter wide.
How does a minuscule, weightless, little nothing like that chip what’s gotta be some seriously strong space glass? Because that little thing was whipping around the Earth at a whooping 17,000 mph.
Doesn’t matter what you are. With that kind of momentum, you wreck shit good.
The image was shared by astronaut Tim Peake, who is in the International Space Station right now.
Often asked if @Space_Station is hit by space debris. Yes – this chip is in a Cupola window https://t.co/iH87Dt80yV pic.twitter.com/7ZvVs4myM0
— Tim Peake (@astro_timpeake) May 12, 2016
That’s gotta be terrifying.
The glass is multilayered, so no one ding could rip a hole in the ISS and send the folks aboard into the vacuum of space. However, anything more than a couple inches big would be devastating to the ship and crew, and scientists estimate nearly 30,000 pieces that size or larger are traveling around the Earth, gunning for our astromen.
Space junk. It’s a real fear.
[Via The Huffington Post]