Chapter 391 - 382: Giant Wave_2

Zhou Qingfeng never expected to be stabbed in the back by his own aerospace sector; such an important operation came without any warning. Wouldn’t he regret missing it for years?

Luckily, tomorrow is Sunday, and since Zhou Qingfeng is still in junior high school and only has supplemental classes on Saturdays, he can make it in time for the live stream in the morning.

Returning to the forum, the activity today was higher than ever, with new posts topping the list every time he refreshed the page.

"Taking pictures of the moon at night! Any experts want to guess when we can catch the Storm spacecraft’s moon rush? Is it possible to capture the spacecraft?"

Second floor: "Sofa, OP, you must be a newbie, right? It’s already night now, and we can’t observe it from our position; not to mention, even theoretically possible observations won’t work—it’s tens of thousands of kilometers away. Ordinary telescopes definitely won’t cut it; just wait for the live broadcast honestly."

Third floor: "Why don’t they start the live broadcast now? With today’s strong communication bandwidth, the signal should be no problem."

Fourth floor: "Upstairs, this is a flight to the moon we’re talking about. There’s probably a mess of tracking and control signals all over space right now. Moreover, the spacecraft is sending its own signals. It needs to pass the Lagrange point before it can transmit signals through the relay satellite in lunar orbit. Bandwidth is still a precious commodity right now."

Fifth floor: "I thought we’d have to wait until August for the Dawn III to orbit the moon. I was worried that Artemis II might overtake us, but now we are definitely the first!"

Sixth floor: "Hey, since we’re orbiting the moon now, does that mean Dawn III can proceed directly to landing on it?"

...

The action by the Storm spacecraft was quite sudden, and the Moon test was only considered in early April when the A100 engine was being prepared for installation on the spacecraft; the Aerospace Development Committee hadn’t planned for it.

To the space agency, the H2 nuclear-powered version was expected to wait until the second half of the year. Even on the eve of Storm’s launch, there was hesitance about undertaking the operation. After all, A100 would be entering space for the first time, and such deep space flight would be a severe test of the engine’s quality.

Before the launch, seven astronauts were gathered for a group photo in honor of the "Skylight" mission and each carried a "Skylight" mission badge. Perhaps it would be brought back to Earth as a memento, or it might get stuck onto the spacesuit and taken to the moon.

On May 13, the Storm crew completed the installation work at the space station and then received instructions from New Yuan base to organize the spacecraft’s internal supplies, inventory fresh water and food, and check the oxygen generator’s working conditions.

On May 15, Hu Dong routinely checked the spacecraft’s flight control and found an update sent from the base—a flight plan.

It was also on that day after intense debate that the Aerospace Development Committee, persuaded by Lin Ju with various analysis reports from the base, decided to begin the "Skylight" plan.

Then, the astronauts aboard the Tiangong Space Station received the news that Storm had detached and after waiting for more than two hours for them to come over and take away the waste, they realized that these seven lucky individuals were already on their way to the moon.

Especially Deng Lei, who was about to re-enter Tiangong with newcomers, his resentful emotions seemed to breach the atmosphere and reach the ground. According to the schedule, his Glory mission was at the end of July.

TeethGrinding.JPG

...

Capital.

"Zhang Zhiguang, so experienced, why isn’t he the commander of mission four?"

Lin Ju finally got the crew list for the Dawn III mission; he was all too familiar with Old Zhang but he was also somewhat puzzled.

The crew of the Dawn IV mission were all newcomers who had just been to space last year, it seemed backwards.

Academician She: "The mission arrangement is like this, and it is not always the case that the one with higher seniority should go. In fact, mission three poses a higher risk, and it makes more sense to send the veterans."

Lin Ju: "But I think mission three should go ahead with the moon landing.

Orbiting the moon is to obtain precise lunar orbit data, and the Skylight plan can essentially complete this work, providing full support for Dawn III to proceed with the lunar landing."

Academician She: "But that would still be too risky. The CZ-10 only had its maiden flight last August. Sending people over a year later would be much quicker than manned spaceflight."

"Times change..."

"Hmm..."

Right now, the two of them were at ground control, and tonight, no one here could rest easy, all were waiting for good news from Storm.

Through the window, the moon hung high in the sky obscured by a thin layer of cloud, with the whole world watching that tiny creature slowly wriggling toward it.

hours, that’s the limit for the A100.

After losing gravity, space became an ideal physical testing ground, one that allows for continuous acceleration at tiny increments to achieve high speeds, as well as for spacecraft to face the momentum required when decelerating.

Lin Ju remembered the star-level battleships in "Three Body", which, when they activated their engines in the Solar System, had tail flames as bright as stars. If it were in low Earth orbit, another small sun would appear in the daytime sky.

How powerful must engines be to create such a spectacle?

"What are you thinking about, Lin? I’m going to rest for a while. I’m old, I can’t stay up like you young people can."

Lin Ju: "Sir She, how far has our country’s EAST progressed?"

"EAST? I’m not too familiar with that, but I spoke with some people from Hefei a couple of months ago.

Anyway, EAST is definitely among the most advanced international projects, and it is expected to build a commercial fusion reactor before 2050.

Do you also want to get involved in this? Don’t take offense at my blunt words, but this is at least an order of magnitude more complex than nuclear fission technology. Even with money, it’s difficult, and it’s a struggle even with the effort of the entire nation."

Academician She wasn’t very familiar with EAST, but he was curious as to why Lin Ju was asking about it.

Lin Ju: "Do you know Cheng Nankai? Isn’t he a nuclear expert? He happens to have done some research on fusion, and he has some theoretical results recently. He wants to discuss them with his peers, and the EAST project team should be able to understand.

He says it’s a very valuable theoretical conjecture, and perhaps EAST has the potential to verify it."

"That... tell him to make a trip to the Academy of Sciences. His ability is definitely not an issue, I’ll give you an introduction."

...

"We’re moving faster than we imagined."

Hu Dong rotated his chair 180 degrees to face the window again.

The 7 astronauts had taken turns to sleep in the past more than ten hours. During the deceleration phase later on, the chairs needed to be rotated 180 degrees, otherwise, the slight backward acceleration would still cause discomfort and too much blood to rush to the face.

They were now just over 20,000 kilometers from the Moon, having covered 90% of their journey, and he had just passed the Lagrange point before he went to sleep.

The Earth was gradually shrinking from a vast entity and now just perfectly filled the huge front window of the Storm.

The Earth is 49 times the volume of the Moon; when viewed from the Moon, Earth appears four times the diameter it does from Earth. But from their current position, the sizes looked about the same.

From the rear camera’s feed, the clear shape of the Moon was still not visible. They had to wait a while for the sunlight to cross the horizon, but Hu Dong could imagine its general outline.

He had observed the Moon from the ground and from the space station with telescopes more than once. It was a sphere that fluctuated between brightness and darkness, its surface scarred with mountains taller than Mount Everest, and with endless resources waiting to be exploited. Despite its desolation, it was a destination destined to be flown to.

Outside the window, Earth had lost its sense of depth, with the majority of the sphere hidden in darkness. The illuminated hemisphere had more land than blue, likely the Indian Ocean.

360,000 kilometers away from Earth, the bond with that blue planet seemed to have thinned to a mere filament, and Hu Dong felt loneliness for the first time.

It was an inner loneliness that felt like standing alone in pitch darkness where no light is seen, everything unknowable, inducing a waveless mood.

During the flight, the seven astronauts initially chatted excitedly, but conversation dwindled as fewer and fewer spoke. Apart from necessary commands, they were all immersed in this loneliness, sometimes feeling as though they were all alone.

"Beep—·—Beep—·—Beep—"

The signal alert woke Hu Dong from his third distraction, reconnecting him with a sense of warmth.

It was a video communication request, and he had a good guess as to who was calling.

After the other six had quickly adjusted their state, he clicked to answer.

"Storm crew, this is Capital, greeting you from here."

Hu Dong: "Reporting to the Commander, all is well aboard the Storm, and the mission is ongoing!"

As they were decelerating, the seven astronauts didn’t stand up, but their superiors, watching the astronauts in their places, truly felt a sense of calm that transcended time and space, closer to space than Tiangong or Shenzhou.