Space ships are not the only hazard or that can be found in space. You have mines fields, fighter wings, Jumpgates, wormholes, pods, and Points in Space/Buoys.

Fighters Wings:
Fighters are mostly used in base defense or assisting larger ships in battles. They compromise of small ships unable to do much on their own, and are much cheaper than spaceships. [more]

Pods:
Anything can be loaded into a pod and boosted into space. Pods travel through space at a speed of at least 20 light years, some empires are faster. Many ships have pod bays that the pods can dock with, allowing a ship to move your pods for you at a much higher than normal boost speed. Pods are usually created at bases with Pod Pad. [more]

Minefields:
When your ships fly through an area of space with a minefield in it they risk hitting a mine and taking damage. The faster they are traveling the greater the odds of hitting a mine. Send in mine sweeping ships to clean up the mess. [more]

Jump Gates:
Jumpgates are doorways where all you have to do is be at the same location as a jumpgate and then put friendly code of the jumpgate you want to go to on your ship. All jumpgated are linked together, so you can use any jumpgate as long as you know the friendly code of the jumpgate you want to go to.

Jumpgates are created with the ship device Jumpgate Builder and can only be destroyed with the super weapon Anti-Matter Maul.

Jumpgate movement are among the last things to take place. After movement and all other ship devices. (not sure about base chunnel though)

Worm Holes:
Similar to Jumpgates but with 2 differences.

• They are not player created/destroyed.
• They can be unstable and move.

Points in Space and Buoys:
Points in space are a GUI tool used to mark a location on the map, and use as a way point. However ocne you view the properties of that Point in space, it now because a buoy.

As a Buoy, other players can see it, and you can put a subject and a message to each one. Normily you can select who can see it, but currently it is bugged. Also, players can scan them if close enough.

Some players use these as a way to draw a border between players, or to show where a common threat is.