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"The mission control experts cannot tell if the space junk is going to hit the space station or not, but they are sure that a collision would knock a hole in the hull and cause all air inside it to quickly escape into space."
What does "would" give a particular meaning in this context? I think assumption/expectation is meant. They assume that a collision knocks a hole in the hull. They expect a collision to knock a hole in the hull.
Is it common the such usage of would?
Would in the OP sentence has a conditional sense. The implied condition is space junk hitting the station: if that happens, other outcomes will follow.
So you are not correct to read it as They assume that a collision knocks a hole in the hull. If you read the whole text again you will see they are not assuming this, they are sure of it. If event A happens, event B will certainly follow. But would is used here because they don't know whether event A (the collision) will happen.
Yes, this is a normal usage of the word.
