Earth Era - Chapter 28: Crimson Heart

Chapter 28: Crimson Heart

There are more than thirty launch sites on Earth. After the Solar Crisis, all commercial, meteorological, monitoring, and civilian satellite launch plans were stopped and replaced with scientific research satellite launch missions. In the past period of time, at least three rockets were launched into space every day, carrying a large amount of materials and technological equipment. However, after the “Anti-Fusion Layer” on the surface of the sun was discovered and it was speculated that a K2 level civilization might exist, all launch plans were stopped. The reason is simple: senior officials of the human government are worried that too many space launch plans will cause misunderstanding with the extraterrestrial civilization and bring disaster to the earth.

After Zhao Huasheng raised the paradox between the two premises, no response was received to the signal sent out by the Star River Telescope for three days, and the possibility of the existence of a super extraterrestrial civilization was reduced, so the large-scale space launch plan was immediately resumed.

This first space launch task was performed at the largest of the many launch sites.

Zhao Huasheng spent several hours getting from the Fire God Solar Telescope Base to the launch site. Launch Site No. 1 was located in the former sub-tropics of the Earth period, and it should be quite hot now at the height of the summer. However, due to the effects of the sun crisis, the average temperature here has dropped to around fifteen degrees Celsius, and at night it can even drop to zero degrees.

The weather today is not very good. There are no clouds in the sky, nor are there any signs of rain or snow, but the wind is very strong, even blowing the helicopter unsteadily. After the helicopter landed, Zhao Huasheng stood up his collar and left the cabin with Meng Zhuo and others. Outside, Wang Tang and others were already there, waiting.

After a brief exchange of pleasantries, everyone headed to the launch control room. On the way, Wang Tang gave a brief introduction of the launch mission.

“This launch is the most important part of the entire Solar Exploration Program,” said Wang Tang. “We have made some improvements to the Mars exploration spacecraft that was already deployed in the Earth’s orbit, such as installing a heat shield, radiation shield, increasing fuel reserves, upgrading the engine and communication equipment power, replacing relevant scientific exploration instruments, and making many other modifications, so that it can finally be transformed into a manned spacecraft capable of performing the solar exploration mission.”

Before the solar crisis broke out, the human government had taken the lead in the ambitious Mars manned exploration program, but when the crucial moment came for the spaceship to finally be assembled and the astronauts to arrive, the plan was put on hold. Now, its use has changed, and its target is no longer Mars but the sun.

There are many differences between the Mars exploration mission and the solar exploration mission. The closest distance between Mars and Earth is only 55 million kilometers; of course, this is only the shortest distance in theory. In actual Mars exploration missions, it is basically impossible for humans to get such a good opportunity. In the original Mars exploration mission trajectory plan, this trajectory length is 800 million kilometers. The “Heart of Scarlet” spacecraft will take 50 days to reach Mars and enter its orbit, then release the lander carrying astronauts to the surface of Mars. After a three-month inspection, it will take about 80 days to return to Earth.

The distance between the sun and the earth is much larger. The average distance is 150 million kilometers, which is twice as much as the Mars exploration mission and a little more. This will inevitably require more materials and fuel reserves, and the space environment near the Sun is much worse than Mars. The Heart of Scarlet can reach Mars, but it can’t get close to the Sun.

Therefore, under the guidance of the human government, the research department made many improvements to the Red Heart and finally enabled it to undertake the mission of approaching the sun.

If there had been enough time, it would undoubtedly have been better to recreate a sun-detecting spacecraft, but unfortunately, the solar crisis broke out too fast, and it would take at least five years to build an interstellar spacecraft, including the initial mission planning, that is, the performance and functions of the spacecraft put forward by the research department, and then the engineering department would make research on how to achieve these functions, draw drawings and submit them for review, and then enter the final construction stage after the review passed.

The construction task will be dispersed to tens of thousands of factories around the world for separate manufacturing. After passing the acceptance, these components will be preliminarily assembled, and then a large number of debugging and tests will be carried out. After passing, they will be launched into the Earth’s orbit by rockets. A temporary space station will also be set up to take charge of the subsequent docking and assembly of these modules, as well as maintenance tasks.

Every rocket launch can only carry part of the spacecraft into space. It takes many launches to assemble the whole spacecraft. The Red Heart Spacecraft has successively carried out more than 100 rocket launches before it was finally assembled in space. During this process, the launch, return, life safety assurance, material assurance, coordination, and command of astronauts responsible for the assembly of spacecraft are all huge projects.

Among the more than 100 rocket launch missions, there were three failures, resulting in the death of four excellent astronauts and the damage of three batches of precious precision instruments.

A total of more than one million excellent scientists, engineers, workers, managers, logistics support personnel, and others participated in this huge project. Human civilization, with its own sweat and blood, spent five years to build this great spacecraft. But in the end, its target changed from Mars to the Sun, which is somewhat dramatic.

The later remodeling mission had a total of 37 rocket launch missions. The Crimson Heart spaceship was very excellent and remodeling it into a solar detector was much more time and resource-saving than building a new one. Now, all the preparations were complete, and the Crimson Heart was ready to go to the sun for an on-site observation. Wang Tang said, “Of course, before that, we need to send the five excellent astronauts to the spaceship first.”

Zhao Huasheng stopped his pace, and his eyes looked towards the distant, rocket, standing like an arrow pointing to the sky.

This was the Great Strength God heavy-duty carrier rocket. It was 70 meters high and had a total weight of 3500 tons. Each launch could send 130 tons of payload into space. This was a miracle in the history of human engineering, being the largest rocket built by humans so far.

The Great Strength God rocket was more than two thousand meters away from Zhao Huasheng. Even at such a distance, the grandeur of the Great Strength God rocket still came into sight. Anyone who saw the rocket would be amazed by its huge size and power.

Zhao Huasheng gazed at it in awe, not knowing what to think. Wang Tang walked up behind him and whispered, “Among the 130 tons of payload for this launch, aside from the five astronauts, three men and two women, there is also a cargo hold full of supplies. It has some propulsion, and after the Great Strength Rocket launches them into space, the astronauts will use the cargo hold and the Red Heart spacecraft to dock and become part of the ship. Then they will get into the cockpit and pilot the Red Heart spacecraft out of Earth’s orbit, heading toward the sun.”

“Robots can never compare to humans, there are many operations that can only be done by them. So, the scientists have designated this mission as a manned flight, they hope that the instruments loaded on the Red Heart spacecraft, as well as the five astronauts, can figure out what the ‘Reverse Fusion Layer’ is and if there is a way to break through it.”

Zhao Huasheng nodded, taking his gaze off of the Great Strength Heavy Launch Rocket, and followed Wang Tang into the control room.

More than a hundred staff members were busy in the control room, monitoring the data of the Great God rocket and the material reserve warehouse at all times.

“I am the commander in chief of the Red Heart No.1 spacecraft launch mission,” said Wang Tang to Zhao Huasheng, “Now it’s the last preparation stage. The astronauts have completed their last physical examination and are on their way here. The launch window is between 2pm and 4pm, according to the weather data, and the Great God rocket will be launched at the right time.”

Zhao Huasheng nodded, and he, Li Wei and Meng Zhuo sat down in the viewing gallery together.

Perhaps it was the solemn atmosphere in the control hall that affected Li Wei, after sitting down, she held Zhao Huasheng’s hand and said in a low voice, “Huasheng, I’m a bit nervous.”

Zhao Huasheng squeezed Li Wei’s hand and also said softly, “Don’t be nervous, the Great Strength No.1 rocket is known for its high safety, this launch will definitely be fine.”

After settling Zhao Huasheng and the others, Wang Tang re-entered the tense work. A lot of data needs Wang Tang to analyze, and a lot of decisions need Wang Tang to make, so Wang Tang can’t stay here for too long to delay Zhao Huasheng.

After waiting for about an hour in the operation hall, the door of the hall opened again. Five astronauts in sky blue cabin uniforms lined up and came in.

Seeing the five astronauts coming in, all the staff in the operation hall put down their work and stood up, and the operation hall was filled with enthusiastic applause.

Wang Tang went up and hugged each of the five astronauts, then stood aside and swept the entire operation hall with a very serious expression.

“These are the five astronauts who will be taking on our mission to explore the sun,” said Wang Tang.