Bolts, old screwdrivers, plastic bags, paint, broken pens, bent CDs - they are the kind of objects you would expect to find in a list of rubbish. Except that this collection of litter is not to be found in the bin at the end of the front garden, but whizzing about in space, threatening to collide with astronauts.

Astronomers working for the European Space Agency (ESA) warned yesterday that space is so full of rubbish that it has become a danger to the people and satellites in it. A team from the Canary Islands Institute of Astrophysics predicted that it will have detected around 100,000 fragments of space rubbish by the time it has finished a definitive catalogue.... ---------clip---