Following the close call the International Space Station had on Thursday by being hit with space junk, NASA released an audio recording of the communications between the astronauts and ground crews.

NASA station crew was alerted of the possibility of being hit with an estimated 13-centimeter-diameter piece of space debris. Crew members entered their Soyuz TMA-13 capsule in case the debris affected the space station and they were required to undock.

The crew remained in the Soyuz until the debris risk had passed and began reconfiguring station systems for normal operations afterwards.

Initially, the debris was classified as posing a low threat of collision with the space station. But the possibility was upgraded to a more dangerous red threat on Thursday morning.

Mission control told the space station astronauts they would have had only 10 minutes of reserves left if the debris had hit the station.

With the uncertainty of it, we are wanting to take a conservative approach, a NASA mission control employee at Johnson Space Center in Houston explained to those aboard the space station. It's a low probability of hit. However, the object is rather large, from what we can track, and if it does happen to hit the ISS, we're talking only about a 10-minute reserve time.

Listen to Mission Control discuss the space debris with Mike Fincke here.

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