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In science fiction asteroid belts are generally shown as much denser than reality, however with the Diaspora we actually get a much closer match due to it being made up of two planets each roughly the size of our own Earth. Crunching the figures, and having the two original planets having close orbits rather than each other, gives me the following (for your amusement and possible use?):
The two asteroid fields are divided by only a small distance in stellar terms, with the gap only slightly emptier than the belts themselves. The density of each ring is some 2,083 times that of our own (which is only 4% the mass of Earth’s moon, with the moon being 1.2% the mass of Earth, therefore our own belts is 0.05% the mass of Earth). Each of the Diaspora’s belts however consist of the remains of a planet the size of our own, resulting in the much denser nature of the belts. Compared with our own which has roughly one asteroid (asteroids over the size of a yard across) per 1,737.5 square miles, those of the Diaspora have around one asteroid per 0.77 square miles…….
Which at the sub-light speeds of a standard vessel does indeed become hazardous (consider each hex in starship combat as being 6 miles across, a vessel travelling at speed 10 is effectively moving at around 10 miles per second or 36,000 mph)......
interesting.
This is an example of why nerds are awesome.