While possible, it's unlikely that the fan is going south. When the fan first starts up it creates a vacuum and is liable to suck up most anything lightweight that's close by. This should be fixed by a few small fingers probing the fan. Typically there is a fairly noticeable difference between the sound of an ailing fan and one that has something caught up in it.
--
John Shatzer, '97 V90 @ 120K

My Blower motor started making the same horrible noise. The motor works good but the sound is killing me. My Indie was working on sealing the fresh air intake to increase the a/c coldness. I will investigate

PS FCPGroton has the blower motor at a great price $68.00. I order it just in case.

Sounds like some debris may have gotten in the blower motor cage. I'd look underneath the passenger side foot well to see if anything is stuck up there. The plastic grill pops off.

Replacing the blower motor was fairly straight forward. Plan for a few hours if it's your first one.

1-Disconnect battery ground. Have the radio code?
2-Remove the glovebox. One screw on each side wall.
3-Remove the plastic kick panels. One under the glovebox. Another one on the right side in front of the door jamb.
4-Remove a/c duct. Has cloth wrapped around it.
5-Remove metal bracket. 12mm socket.
6-Disconnect electrical connectors to gain access to blower motor screws. There are (4) screws. You need a 1/4 drive, 7mm socket and a swivel. Swivel is for screw on the very right side. Or you can use a 7mm open end wrench. (3) of the (4) screws holds the blower motor in. Blower motor should come right out after that.

Some bits of weather stripping/insulation crumbled in my hands upon removal of the blower motor. The new motor came with some.

That's all I can remember.

Good Luck!

95' 964 175k