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Asteroid Thicket: Difference between revisions
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Conversely, planetary rings are (relatively) much more sparse in fiction than real life --dense. Voyager 2 flew through Saturn's G ring--one of the fainter rings--once, at an angle, and there was [http://spaceflightnow.com/cassini/040612soi.html "lots of evidence of micrometeroid hits"] on the quite small 4-meter diameter probe. However, aspiring SF writers should know that these planetary ring systems are mostly made up of ice and rocks 0.01 to 10 meters across.
A subtrope of [[Artistic License Astronomy]], [[Space Does Not Work That Way]] and [[Sci
Compare [[Space Clouds]], a trope about the similarly unrealistic portrayal of nebula in fiction; also [[Vulcan Has No Moon]] for when objects in space are visible in locations where they make no sense (either due to the science or due to pre-established canon). Also compare [[Conveniently Close Planet]] - an [[Asteroid Thicket]] could be considered "frustratingly close asteroids". A space born equivalent to an [[Aerial Canyon Chase]] will take place in one.
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* ''Meteor'' shows our solar system's own asteroid belt being like this, with two large asteroids close enough that when one gets hit by a comet, a spacecraft orbiting the other gets destroyed by the debris.
* The lunar shuttle in ''[[Airplane!]] II: The Sequel'' encounters a ridiculously dense asteroid belt after it goes off course. Made [[Rule of Funny|doubly ridiculous]] because of the way they're going: know any asteroid belts between the Earth and the Sun? Me neither.
** Though there might be [
*** It's a comedy. Shush.
* The introductory zoom-scene from ''[[Contact (Video Game)|Contact]]'' shows our own asteroid belt as one of these. The scene is otherwise fairly accurate on scales, however (except for the distance of radio transmissions).
** The team that created the opening said they did it on purpose partly for [[Rule of Cool]] and partly because [[Viewers are Morons|most people would think]] a fully accurate portrayal of the entire sequence [[Reality Is Unrealistic|would look "wrong."]]
* In the 2011 film ''[[Green Lantern (Film)|Green Lantern]]'', the green lantern leads the [[Big Bad]] through a classic asteroid thicket. There then follows a questionably plausible sequence involving the sun. Also, the solar system is apparently [[Sci
* ''[[Armageddon]]'' explains the cloudburst of meteorites as the result of a comet passing through the asteroid belt and bouncing shrapnel into Earth's vicinity, including an asteroid "the size of Texas," whatever that means. This is doubly wrong, once for thinking that a single comet could collide with so many asteroids and conveniently shove them in the same general direction, and twice for thinking that a comet (size range 100 meters to 40+ kilometers) could knock a Texas-sized piece of anything out of the belt entirely.
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* Averted in ''[[2001: A Space Odyssey (Film)|2001: A Space Odyssey]]''. While passing through the asteroid belt ''Discovery'' passes within visual range of one asteroid. They deliberately chose their route to bring them close enough to make observations of that asteroid.
** This is another example of Clarke getting stuff right. When ''2001'' was written, scientists weren't sure if it was even ''possible'' to travel through the Asteroid Belt. In fact, this was one of the reasons why Pioneer 10 and 11 even were launched, to make sure that the more expensive Voyager probes would be able to make it. While they were wrong about the [[Asteroid Thicket]], the probes found that the radiation produced by Jupiter would have damaged the electronic equipment on the Voyager probes. They were hurriedly amended.
*** In addition, one of the planned approaches to Saturn would have taken one of the Voyagers through the [
** Speaking of being chock full of lovely dust: Although ''2001'' portrays the asteroid belt as being nearly empty of '''big''' rocks, it also describes ''Discovery'''s main communications antenna dish as being riddled with extremely tiny holes, punched by the micrometeorites that permeate the asteroid belt.
* Averted and explained in ''The Martian Way'' by [[Isaac Asimov]], who says that perhaps the spaceships didn't have to waste propellant to go around the asteroid belt, since, while on map it looks like a swarm of insects, it would take real stroke of bad luck in order to hit a rock.
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== Live Action TV ==
* ''[[Battlestar Galactica Reimagined
** Might have been justified when they were in the debris disk around the black hole. Every other instance, however...
** Actually, the 'asteroid field' in ''Scar'' was argued to be a protoplanetary disc, because the science advisors or whatnot knew that asteroids weren't packed together but still wanted a dangerous dogfight situation.
* The ''[[Blake's Seven
* The pilot (episode, not the character Pilot) of ''[[Farscape (TV)|Farscape]]'' had an [[The Asteroid Thicket|asteroid thicket]].
** In the ''Peacekeeper Wars'' wrap-up mini-series, [[The Dragon|Braca]] leads a fighter squadron through a planetary ring in order to strike at the rear of the Scarran battle fleet. Plausible (not the thicket) in that radiation would keep the squadron's approach masked from enemy sensors.
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* The [[Star Wars]]-Risk boardgame used an impenetrable asteroid field to represent planets destroyed by the Death Star, rendering travel in the region.
* ''[[Twilight Imperium]]'' features asteroid belts that take up the same amount of space as a star system and pose a serious problem for the movement of certain classes of starships.
* The Asteroid fields in ''[[Battlefleet Gothic]]'' are an [[Egregious]] example, probably caused by [[The Coconut Effect|the target audience expecting]] [[Space Is an Ocean|"terrain" to fight around]]. The effects of asteroid fields are thus: Anything unguided (a space hulk, torpedoes and so on) are automatically destroyed upon entry. [[Old School Dogfighting|Attack craft]] have a 1 in 6 chance of destruction and full space ships (from [[Standard Sci
* ''[[Eclipse Phase]]'' actually manages to avoid this. There are asteroid fields, but they're exactly as they are in reality.
* In ''[[Star Fleet Battles]]'', asteroid fields are thick enough so that any ship or seeking weapon passing through them has a significant chance of taking damage, possibly enough to destroy it. They also interfere enough with sensors to allow ships and bases to hide within them.
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== [[Real Life]] ==
* Until the [
** And there's the [http://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov DAWN spacecraft] whose mission is to explore the asteroid Vesta and after that go to the [[Science Marches On|minor planet]] Ceres.
* At least one extrasolar asteroid belt has been discovered, with measurements indicating that it's much more densely packed than our own.
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[[Category:Artistic License Astronomy]]
[[Category:Asteroid Thicket]]
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