Leonard David's INSIDE OUTER SPACE

Catch and release. ISS robot arm is used for grabbing and letting lose space hardware.
Image credit: NASA

In what may be judged as a bizarre and twisted case of “assault and battery,” a high-speed cylindrical object weighing nearly two pounds hit the roof of Alejandro Otero’s home last month in Naples, Florida, smashing through a ceiling and punching through a floor.

There is speculative finger-pointing going on as to origin of the high-speed intruder, a straight up verdict that, yes, it came from outer space – and in the form of space junk.

The still-to-be-verified close encounter with clutter from the cosmos has already sparked technical and legal banter about the worrisome escalation of Earth-circling, human-made leftovers.

During the uncontrolled fall of space hardware, seconds and minutes count. They can add up to de-orbiting riff raff plunging into isolated ocean waters or reaching land.
(Image credit: The Aerospace Corporation/Center for Space Policy and Strategy)

As the saying goes, timing-is-everything. However, this event appears to be years in the making.

Go to my new Scientific American story – “Suspected Space-Junk Strike in Florida Signals New Era of Orbital Debris – Three years ago astronauts threw out the largest piece of trash ever tossed from the International Space Station. Now some of it seems to have punched a hole through a house in Naples, Fla. – at:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/space-junk-from-the-international-space-station-may-have-struck-a-home-in/