Chapter 78 - 76 CZ6R Second Explosion_1

June 25, 11 a.m., Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center.

The CZ-6 reusable Y2 rocket stood erect on the launch pad, with its 3.5-meter fairing making the rocket appear somewhat top-heavy.

Why not launch from the Bingzhou Satellite Launch Center? Because it was still being reorganized due to the explosion of the last Y1 mission.

The staff at Jiuquan were also quite nervous upon hearing this news, looking at the CZ-6 as if it were some kind of terrifying object, constantly advising He Tang.

"Old He, our space bureau’s rockets aren’t expensive to begin with. What’s the point in fussing over this thing? How much money can it really save by recovering it? Will that end up in your pocket?"

"Director Qin, trust me, Ma Yilong has had so many explosions, and this has been just one failure for us. The mistakes of our last mission will not be repeated!"

In the end, Director Qin of the launch center looked at the upright CZ-6, shook his head, and left. He Tang was left behind, clenching his fist and muttering to himself, "CZ-6, CZ-6, you must bring honor to the Eighth Academy."

One hour later, the midday news aired a breaking update:

"...China’s newly developed CZ-6R reusable launch vehicle has successfully completed its first full-state maiden flight at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center, successfully placing eight scientific experimental satellites into a 500-kilometer sun-synchronous orbit. During the recovery operation, a mechanical failure led to an unsuccessful retrieval, causing the rocket to topple at the designated landing field. There were no casualties or significant property damage..."

The CZ6R-Y2 mission experienced an anomaly with the attitude stabilization system at 11:42 a.m. that day, with excessive correction amplitude. After the support legs touched the ground, the rocket tipped over and exploded upon impact.

The explosion did not cause significant damage to the landing site, but the debris was too much to be easily cleared. The director of the launch center stated that at least three months would be needed to clean up and revise the safety protocols, and no more CZ-6 launches could be accommodated during this period.

Upon seeing this news report, Lin Ju could only silently wish the Eighth Academy good luck.

...

"Slow down, slow down, this equipment is extremely valuable. There’s no backup for this; if it’s gone, it’s gone."

"What’s there to fear? It’s shock-resistant, isn’t it? If it can withstand the vibrations of a rocket launch, why worry about a little jostling?"

At the New Yuan City airport, a team of researchers from the Fifth Academy wearing white lab coats supervised the unloading of an immense experimental cabinet measuring 3X2.5X4 from a transport aircraft, its surface wrapped in thick protective layers.

To fulfill the system’s prescribed scientific payload requirements, Lin Ju had been trying to scrape together 3.6 tons of scientific payload while staying under the radar.

So, he took the lead in teaming up with some universities to prepare a rough and huge piece of equipment to send up—anyway, as long as the weight was within limits, that’s all that mattered!

The space bureau couldn’t stand idly by and watch.

First, they saw the New Yuan-2 Y2 mission send up a sports car, and then, upon finding out that the New Yuan-2 Y3 mission would also send a car, they inwardly cursed the waste of resources.

When they inquired about what the Y3 mission was planning to send, they learned about the "space multifunctional large vacuum-radiation combined test platform" developed by several universities with a total weight of 3,950 kilograms.

It sounded impressive at first glance, but upon closer inspection of the specifications, the space bureau was dismayed. What was touted as a combined test platform was nothing more than a disorganized conglomeration of experimental instruments. A payload of nearly 4 tons was entirely unnecessary; one ton was sufficient for a satellite. It was simply a waste of lift capacity.

The space bureau felt that allowing these unprofessional attempts to go unchecked was unacceptable, so they forcefully intervened and brought out the backup comprehensive test platform prepared for Tiangong No.2.

The university projects could be added to this comprehensive test platform. The space bureau would provide technical support and allocated 800 kilograms for their use. The rest would be handled by the space bureau itself.

Lin Ju did not object to this, but he had one condition: the total mass of the platform could not be less than before.

The space bureau found this to be a non-issue. They had only heard of requests to reduce weight, never to increase it. They casually bumped the final mass up to 4,200 kilograms, reaching 90% of the Progress spacecraft’s carrying capacity.

On June 28, the large comprehensive test platform arrived in New Yuan City. It was designed to fit perfectly with the cargo compartment of the Progress spacecraft and to be connected to the inside of Progress via communication lines, allowing scientific experiments to be conducted from the operation panel inside the crew cabin.

This required minor modifications to Progress, but these could be completed in a maximum of four or five days without affecting safety.

Accompanying the group this time was Academician Zhao Zong, the deputy head designer of Tiangong No.2.

Upon arriving at the New Yuan Factory to cooperate on the transformation project, he also learned about New Yuan’s space station plan.

Currently, the only project that New Yuan was actually undertaking was the XS-62 tourism module, which could guarantee usage on its own. The plan was to build just two modules, which would be sufficient for commercial spaceflight use, with supplies being provided by H1 spaceplanes in the future.

New Yuan had also preliminarily established its own space station standards, including basic parameters like atmospheric pressure and temperature, as well as communication protocols. Zhao Zong found the latter, along with the docking port dimensions, quite surprising.

Firstly, the communication protocol; he discovered that the entire Xinyuan Company was using the RX01 data bus, an internal standard that had some compatibility issues with currently active space station modules that could dock with it.

Secondly, the docking port; because the module diameter reached an astonishing 7.6 meters, New Yuan’s docking port dimensions were an exaggerated 2.5 meters by 2.5 meters square, much bigger than the International Space Station’s 1.2-meter square portal and China’s 0.85-meter round one.

Of course, all these were minor issues. What truly made a space professional like him green with envy was the sheer size of the space station; a single module with 620 cubic meters of space was already two-thirds the total volume of the International Space Station and fifteen times that of Tiangong No.1, yet it did not contain a single high-value scientific research equipment. It was all used for space tourism.

Out of the 42-tonne module, 30 tons were dedicated to luxury. Each individual could enjoy a 10 cubic meter, 2 meters wide by 3 meters long, arc-shaped private bedroom, and there were a whole four of these bedrooms! There were even specially designed individual windows for gazing at the stars while falling asleep, a true pinnacle of opulence.

Compared to that, the sleeping quarters designed for our own space station seemed to resemble nothing so much as the little compartments in a morgue...

However, when it came to cost, the XS-62 was actually much cheaper. One piece of expensive scientific equipment on Tiangong No.2 could be used to build two XS-62 modules, but this still left a bitter taste in one’s mouth!

Although New Yuan had officially entered the national space engineering program more than half a month ago, they had only managed to snag a few insignificant small satellite deals. The large-scale plans were still being discussed and adjusted due to the involvement of so many departments, with the space station program of the Fifth Academy being one such element.

For example, CZ-5 was developed for space station missions and unmanned Moon and Mars exploration. Now if you don’t want it and would prefer to use New Yuan-2, whose investment does that fall under?

So now there is a lot of internal bickering within the Space Agency...

...

On July 3rd, the H1 No. 2 machine "Unity" was lifted into space by the freshly-retrofitted New Yuan-2 rocket, successfully delivering a luxury SUV worth 88 million yuan from Southern Automobile into orbit.

Southern Automobile began a comprehensive self-promotion campaign, seizing the aerospace tie-in to elevate their brand status, and subtly positioned themselves as the potential leader among domestic car manufacturers.

Additionally, the New Yuan-1 family also conducted two commercial satellite launches, but these were overshadowed by the glory of New Yuan-2.

By now, the domestic audience seemed numb to large rocket launches; with New Yuan-2 having three launches in 40 days, and even though they were alternating between two rockets, it was still enough to prove the capabilities of New Yuan Aeronautics.

Simultaneously, New Yuan publicly announced its commercial manned spaceflight program. The first group tour, comprising Chen Weizhang and another coal tycoon, along with island country millionaire Mae Mayu, is expected to take place in April of next year. The total agreed price was 930 million RMB, which is approximately 150 million US dollars.

Averaged out, each person spent only 50 million US dollars to experience a 7-day trip on the space station along with daily extravehicular activities, which is a bargain compared to the previous few instances of billionaire space tourism.

After internal calculations, Lin Ju determined that by continuously hosting six billionaires for two missions, the average cost would not exceed 230 million yuan per mission. The profit for a single trip would be nearly 700 million yuan, with a profit margin as high as 300%. After the initial two flights to pay off the space station’s expenses, each subsequent mission could earn an additional 60 million, resulting in even more staggering profits.

Ma also saw New Yuan’s commercial crewed mission plans and did some calculations himself, concluding that New Yuan’s profit margin was between 65% and 85%. The profits were far from low.

He also noticed that the most attractive aspects of Lin Ju’s commercial plans were the exclusive use of the luxurious space station and the extravehicular activities, both of which SpaceX was fully capable of accomplishing.

Thus, merely 10 hours later, Sky Fork also immediately announced its own brand new manned space station tourism plan. However, their module was smaller, accommodating only 3 people, including two wealthy individuals, with a 7-day trip averaging 50 million US dollars per person.

Even though this was more expensive than New Yuan Aeronautics, being on America’s home turf, Ma was still confident in attracting customers.

Following this, other private American space companies like Blue Origin, Nevada Mountain, and Virgin Galaxy all expressed their own plans for commercial human spaceflight and started to gravitate towards Lin Ju’s approach.

New Yuan Aeronautics forcefully kickstarted the commercial spaceflight boom singlehandedly, compelling companies to upgrade their technology to reusable ones if they wanted to continue making substantial profits like before.

The only entity that outwardly remained unshaken was the Space Agency. They had to grit their teeth and pretend not to hear, having no so-called paid manned commercial projects of their own. Best to settle internal matters first...