Chapter 227 - 221 Defeat_1

At 8:45 a.m., the rocket performed its final self-check before launch.

The launch center was connected to the Capital, with Academician She, the person in charge of the Dawn project and also the Commander, appearing on the screen.

Yun Hongjun: "Report to the Commander, all sensors on the entire rocket are normal, line communication is normal, weather conditions are good, we can continue with the launch procedure, please give your instructions!"

"Proceed with the launch as planned!"

The connection was brief, but everyone in the control room could see the seriousness on Academician She’s face.

As the minutes and seconds passed by, the launch time was slowly approaching, and aside from the occasional voice of the broadcaster, only the sound of breathing could be heard in the launch center.

The hundreds of thousands of spectators on the distant beach, including people from several countries, gradually quieted down, waiting for that moment.

Zhou Qingfeng was sitting cross-legged in a chair, with his grandfather Zhou Rui at the university, he was watching alone at home.

Although he was still just a sixth-grade primary school student, according to his grandfather’s plan, he would definitely be able to attend Southern Aeronautical and Astronautical University and join New Yuan, becoming an engineer and astronaut.

His favorite thing to do each week was to sit in the backseat when his grandfather’s colleagues flew at Tiger Mountain Airport and overlook the earth and blue sky from the Colorful Cloud trainer aircraft.

Three minutes before launch, the last sentence in the TV came from the newsroom:

Presenter: "This launch carries an early version of the new generation crewed spacecraft test vehicle, a reused test vehicle that will once again verify the reliability of the spacecraft and the stability of the CZ-10 rocket."

16,000 kilometers away, in Claire’s office, the curtains were drawn, and only the screen emitted a dazzling white light in the night, but they seemed completely unaware, just staring at the rocket and the countdown numbers in the top left corner of the screen.

"Ten, nine, eight... Booster engine starts."

When massive amounts of water engulfed the bottom engine, the eight YF130 engines of CZ-10’s four boosters were the first to ignite, the flames immediately turning the cooling water into violently expanding mist, spreading in all directions.

"Three, two, one!"

"メインエンジン始動します (Main engines start)!"

Amidst the multilingual countdowns echoing on the beach, the 10 double-chamber YF130 stage combustion cycle liquid oxygen kerosene engines all started up, with each of the 20 nozzles having over 240 tons of sea level thrust; all merged into an orange sphere of light, completely obscuring the launch pad.

Even though the sun had already risen, the second sun before them felt more glaring, the bright orange flames lighting everyone’s faces, reflecting on the ground in red.

Xie Liaofu stood up and walked to the window of the launch center, seeing the star that was rising in the distance.

The 10 YF130 engines that took only eight months for production to be finalized were extraordinarily stable; with less than a 0.5% difference in thrust among the engines, the control computer hardly needed to gimbal the nozzles for the rocket to climb steadily upwards.

With the CZ-10’s four boosters being identical to the core stage, similar to a reinforced CBC, the thrust-to-weight ratio was very high at 1.41, with an ascent speed much faster than that of New Yuan No. 3.

The engines, now operating at 106% capacity, were producing a total thrust of 5,100 tons; those who weren’t first-time watchers could feel the familiar earthquake sensation, even their bodies vibrating from the inside out due to the sound waves in the air.

Passing through the clouds, the flight attitude of CZ-10 was extremely stable; with a speed reaching Mach 7, a sonic boom cloud was created at the location of the central booster cones.

The air flowed backward along the rocket’s body but was pushed open and dispersed by the tail flame of the engines, this scene clearly displayed in the camera.

For a full 150 seconds, until it was already somewhat difficult to see from the ground, the rocket seemed to have experienced no anomalies.

Claire stared intently at the rocket’s body and couldn’t spot anything abnormal.

At 190 seconds, the boosters’ fuel was exhausted, the explosive bolts of the splitters were electrified, and with a slight tremor of the core stage, the four boosters fell towards the ground in a cross pattern.

"Korolyov Cross!"

Upon hearing someone utter this term in a not-so-loud voice, Xie Liaofu’s mouth curved into a faint smile.

Another 10 seconds passed, and the fuel of Core Stage One also ran out, the two YF130 engines shut down, and stage one was detached.

At this point, the tense atmosphere in the launch center had begun to dissipate, gradually relaxing.

Only a few people still stared intently at the screen, watching the ignition of the second stage.

At 200 seconds, the four YF-77 hydrolox engines of the second stage-third stage combination, which had already been sent out of the atmosphere by the "half-stage" boosters, ignited.

At this moment, thrust was no longer the main factor, the YF77’s more than 400 seconds of specific impulse could directly send the third stage and its payload all the way to lunar orbit, and its thrust was not insignificant either—combined, the four YF77s produced a total of 280 tons of force, quite powerful.

According to the first flight procedure for this mission, the second stage rocket would only operate for a short time, separating and falling back into the atmosphere after testing, leaving the third stage rocket to use two YF77s to send the test spacecraft into orbit for testing, and it too would turn around to return after 24 hours.

Victory was within reach.

Even Yun Hongjun was about to breathe a sigh of relief and wipe his sweat when a voice rang out in the control room:

"Engine 5A has shut down abnormally!"

The engines of CZ-10 are numbered with the core stage as 0, the four boosters are sequentially 1 to 4, and the second stage is designated as number 5, followed by engines A, B, C, and D.

Now, one of the YF77 engines in the second stage had shut down.

Simultaneously, from the camera at the tail of the second stage rocket, it seemed as if something had flown out of the shutdown engine’s tail.

Everyone knew that those were parts from that engine.

This indicated that the flight computer had detected a catastrophic failure in engine 5A and, to avoid affecting the other engines, had shut it down directly, but still, an incident resulting in ejected parts had occurred.

Among the experts dispatched to the Qiongzhou site from the Sixth Academy was Liu Minglu, the deputy chief designer of YF77, who at that moment felt his heart lurch.

Because engine 5A had shut down, to maintain balance, it was necessary to shut down the symmetric Engine 5B, leaving only two YF77 engines operational. Although they could still achieve orbit insertion for the payload, reaching lunar orbit was now out of the question.

This fault had occurred in less than 20 seconds of burn time, but the YF77 was meant to work for a total of 420 seconds, requiring consideration for multiple starts and stops.

Given the current state, could they guarantee a successful Moon mission?

As everyone’s gaze turned to Liu Minglu, he only repeated three words:

"Turbopump, turbopump... it must be a turbopump issue. The liquid hydrogen is too cold and too corrosive; we should have conducted more tests."

Meanwhile, Claire, who was ready to shut down her computer and take a nap, noticed something wrong in the live broadcast animation showing the trajectory of the upper stage, which had started to deviate abnormally.

Within less than a minute, she knew what had happened.

Even two YF77 engines were sufficient to complete the mission’s inaugural flight, but a CZ-10 in this state was clearly incapable of sending the spacecraft assembly to the Moon.

The first flight of CZ-10 could only be considered a partial success.

Claire closed her eyes, tipped her head back to thank God, and finally succumbed to sleepiness, falling asleep.