In the asteroid belt, that is situated between Mars and Jupiter, there are four major mining companies that are in competition against each other to mine the richer asteroids in order the get their precious ore to Earth.
The main ores in demand at the present are magnesium, silicon, titanium and zirconium. There are four asteroid in the belt that are used for mining but each is only rich in one of the ores.
The asteroids that are being mined are Juno which is rich in zirconium, Pallas which is rich in titanium, Ceres which is rich in silicon and Vesta which is rich in magnesium. These asteroids are roughly equal distances from each other and the companies have set up the bases between them.
The demand for the ores are so great that the four companies are stopping at nothing to being the first company to reach Earth for each delivery. Each company has only three ships each that are suitable for carry two loads of the required delivery amount.
The companies have resorted to placing weapons on their ships to destroy other ships in order to be leaders of the market. Although the ships weapons are not very powerful they can disable to ships for a short time which will drift out of control but there is always the danger of crashing into another asteroid or drifting into the deadly radiation zone around the Sun.
It is for the very reason that the police zone around the Earth was set up. The police zone however can do very little to help since the zone cannot extend very far and also is confined to the Earth as it moves in orbit around the Sun. However what it can do is arrest any ship that tries to attack another ship whilst in the zone and can rescue any ships that drifts into the zone.
Apart from Pallas, Vesta, Ceres and Juno there are eleven other asteroids in the mining vicinity that the ships are in danger of crashing into if they have been attacked. These are NZ8901, NZ8, NZ77017, NZ4478, EZ336, EZ11, SZ4178, SZ29, SZ117, WZ14 and WZ119.
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