14 DAY TRIAL // Those who have watched Gravity can understand the extreme dangers space junk can pose to any missions in space, and that, yes, they can happen all the time.
Yesterday morning, the ISS crew had to literally run to docked ISS Soyuz spacecrafts to save their lives when a piece of an old Russian satellite was discovered as inbound towards the station at a very high speed. The evacuation was ordered because there was no time to move the station off the satellite piece's trajectory so the only solution was to abandon the ship.
Usually, the ISS astronauts get warned in time about debris coming their way, helped by various teams of enthusiasts that track orbiting junk movement from Earth and get to maneuver the station in time to avoid collisions. This time, however, it was too late for that and an evacuation plan was put in motion. Thankfully, the old satellite passed by the station without causing any damage, and the crew returned safely to their living quarters.
Space junk is no joking matter
Space debris still remains a serious issue in near-earth orbit, endangering every manned mission that has to pass through a growing cloud of orbiting junk that travels with the speed of sound. However, efforts to prevent such issues are being made with the newer satellites having implemented methods of entering graveyard orbiting during their EoL (End of Life) periods. Graveyard orbiting lifts the satellites to 225 km higher orbits, called supersynchronous orbit, where they do not pose any danger to lower satellites while they are operationally dead. Methods of clearing space of junk have been imagined or are in development stages, but as of now, no real solution to this issue exists.
What baffles me is that we could've lost the ISS yesterday and nobody had any idea the space station just dodged a bullet, semi-pun intended.