So something really crazy just happened!

[VincentMcConnell]

I put a new rocket I designed at school into orbit around Kerbin (worked nominally the first time...). It\'s currently in a 62 mile orbit and about to separate from the second stage. Anyway, I saw a purple indicator behind me when I turned the camera. I had just jettisoned my first stage booster away and thought nothing of the debris until I realized that debris has no indicator! I scrolled over it and found that I had passed 2 km from a previously orbited spacecraft (Neptune I). After circularizing into this 62 mile orbit, I saw the debris cross underneath me again (it\'s in an elliptical orbit of 100x72). I passed within 300 meters. Basically, an ACCIDENTAL RENDEZVOUS.

Fearing this isn\'t worthy of a thread, I\'m going to save it with this: Share your unbelievable encounters with previous missions here.

[trbinsc]

I hit my space station once. Wasn\'t really by accident, but I had forgotten about the ship that I had placed in an orbit that would exactly hit the station using an orbit modification tool. Gave me quite a shock until I remembered what I had done.

[AlternNocturn]

My experiences aren\'t really all that spectacular, but I did get a kick out of watching an equatorial mission pass within only a few km of a polar mission.

[E. F. Kranz]

Launched, fatal failure at 80km 1000m/s. Winglets and decouplers and engines and tanks everywhere, the thing completely disassembled itself.

VAB. Strut. Fixed. Relaunched.

....

Flew directly into a cloud of debris from the previous flight. ???

Didn\'t hit anything, but also didn\'t expect it to be there. It was pretty cool.

[kerbalgamer]

blew up in air asas saved the crew and they survived ;D

[RandomGuy5040]

JEB: Alright, we\'re heading home. Another successful Mun mission! High fives all around! 8)

BILL: Wait, what is that on the radar? ???

BOB: Unknown object approaching! Distance is 300m and closing.

BILL: We have visual - it\'s our communications satellite. >

JEB: Okay, got it. Distance?

BOB: Distance is 150m. ???

JEB: Bill, activate SAS and point us in the opposite direction of the satellite. Tell me when you\'re done. 8)

BILL:Got it. ???

BOB: Distance 100m! We\'re gonna crash!

BILL: I hope this works, Jeb... fire!

JEB: Firing!

JEB:...We\'re at zero fuel. RCS is shot too. Distance, Bob? 8)

BOB: AAHHHHH!!!

JEB:... Bill?

BILL: AAHHHHH!!!

JEB: Fine, I\'ll do it myself! *shoves Bob out of the way of the radar console*

JEB: Distance 50m. We\'re still closing. ...Crud.

JEB: Distance 40m. I guess this is the end.

JEB: Engineering, it was great working with you. This rocket gave us a smooth ride. :\'(

JEB: So this is how it ends. Brace for impact.

*dink*

JEB: Huh? ???

JEB: We\'re 20m from the satellite... and rising!

BILL: ...what?

BOB: We\'re OK!

JEB: Good to be with you guys still. The engine slowed us enough to prevent a fatal impact. 8)

BILL: We\'ve sustained damage. We\'ve lost an RCS thruster, and the fuel tank is ruptured.

BOB: The fuel tank\'s empty, we\'re fine! We\'re fine!

JEB: We\'re entering the atmosphere now. We\'re home, guys. We\'re home. 8)

[Kreuzung]

13 engines, 4 did not activate, rest went out of fuel or exploded in sub-orbital trajectory. Pod was ripped away when chutes deployed, rest went into the sea in around 2 seconds ;D

Edited August 8, 2012 by Kreuzung

[Elven_sword]

I have a cloud of debris orbiting Kerbin that I call the 'TKS megacloud.' It\'s the remains of a TKS-Angara craft that ejected its 8 liquid boosters, which broke apart, as did the main booster. The TKS made it home safely, but its remains have claimed the lives of hundreds of Mun-bound kerbals, creating more debris, making it even more dangerous to launch when it\'s overhead. The debris has its periapsis right over the launchpad, with top speeds of about 2 KPS, so grabbing bits of it is out.

[Zephram Kerman]

I have a cloud of debris orbiting Kerbin that I call the 'TKS megacloud.' It\'s the remains of a TKS-Angara craft that ejected its 8 liquid boosters, which broke apart, as did the main booster. The TKS made it home safely, but its remains have claimed the lives of hundreds of Mun-bound kerbals, creating more debris, making it even more dangerous to launch when it\'s overhead. The debris has its periapsis right over the launchpad, with top speeds of about 2 KPS, so grabbing bits of it is out.

WANT.

[avan]

Wow, thats both worse and more awesome than the huge debris plumes that the SRB-overloaded ships I was firing off to see if I could collide with Kerbol (mostly to see if it had a terrain mesh & could be collided with. Latter is true, former is false as it turns out - I must now attempt a landing!). Anyways, with an early version of the ship, I made the mistake of allowing mechjeb to try to pilot it; like on every massive ship with small peripheral SRBs that I\'ve let it pilot so far, it shook the outer boosters off, which then collided with boosters further in and caused a chain reaction of structural failures, and created a massive sub-orbital debris plume 30-50km in altitude. The next two launches blew up due to crashing into the debris, ending up adding to the cloud. 4th launch finally made it through mostly intact (though it did lose two SRBs in a collision), but I accidentally hit the spacebar on an upper stage which had not completed its burn, and so I scrubbed that one. So on the 5th launch, I decided to just wait 24hrs for the next launch window, by then the debris had all landed.

I\'ve also had a lot of close encounters with my low-orbiting munar orbiters (at various altitudes between 4 and 10km) and my munar landers (As well as one ascent vehicle from a lander).