Great Country Academician

Xu Chuan thought about the date for the moon landing project and took out his mobile phone from his pocket: "June"

Looking at the calendar on his phone, he thought for a while and his eyes fell on a festival.

"In June, why not schedule the moon landing project to June 21st? The 21st happens to be the summer solstice, and the 22nd is the Dragon Boat Festival, one of the four major traditional festivals in our traditional culture."

After a pause, he continued: "The fifth line of the Qian Gua of the Book of Changes says: "The flying dragon is in the sky. The Dragon Boat Festival is an auspicious day for the "flying dragon in the sky", also known as the Dragon Day Festival. Although this has nothing to do with the moon, the Xinghai ship set sail on this day, like a dragon entering the sea, which just means that we are the descendants of the dragon and have entered the universe. "

"Let's use a manned moon landing to present a special gift to the Dragon Boat Festival, to the people of the country and even to the people of the world!"

Although it is the first time for Xinghai to land a man on the moon, it does not mean that the space shuttle will be the first time to land on the moon.

No matter which country it is, it is impossible to directly send astronauts to the moon without conducting unmanned lunar landing experiments. It is impossible to directly send astronauts to the moon without conducting unmanned lunar landing experiments in aerospace engineering.

This is irresponsible for the lives of astronauts!

For example, the Apollo manned moon landing project launched a total of 17 spacecraft from 1966 to 1972.

Among them, numbers 1 to 3 are simulated spacecraft, numbers 4 to 6 are unmanned spacecraft, numbers 7 to 10 are manned spacecraft orbiting the earth or the moon, and numbers 11 to 17 are manned lunar landing spacecraft.

The famous Apollo 11 was the first lunar landing spacecraft known to later generations.

Perhaps in a few years, travel between the Earth and the Moon will become the norm. But at least for now, with current aerospace technology, it is impossible for any country to do such a thing.

The same goes for Xinghai. It is impossible for it to directly carry astronauts to the moon on its first voyage.

Before June 21st, it will conduct two unmanned lunar landing projects to conduct experiments to ensure that no problems will occur during the manned lunar landing.

As long as there is an accident in either of these two experiments, the time for manned moon landing will be postponed.

Only by ensuring that there are no problems with the two unmanned lunar landings will the manned lunar landing be officially launched on June 21.

After hearing the date chosen by Xu Chuan, Academician Chang Huaxiang glanced at him in surprise, smiled and said, "I didn't expect you to study books like the Book of Changes and Qian Gua."

He was not surprised at all that this person would choose to start the manned moon landing project on June 21st.

When it comes to date selection for some major projects, it is well known to those in the industry that this person prefers traditional festivals.

When the space base previously discussed which day in June the manned moon landing might be launched, many people were predicting the Dragon Boat Festival.

What surprised him was that this person was so familiar with the "Book of Changes and Qian Gua". He just opened his mouth to read something like this that ordinary people couldn't memorize.

Skipping the digression, Chang Huaxiang returned to the topic and continued: "June 21st is within the scope of the inspection, and it is quite appropriate. If you are sure, I will record it and report it to the space agency. "

Xu Chuan didn't think too much about the date selection for some major projects. His idea was very simple. If it could bring joy to the Chinese people during traditional festivals, that would be great.

Smiling, he continued: "On this day, the moon landing will start in the early morning of June 21. If we calculate the time, we can send our astronauts to the moon around noon on the second day of the Dragon Boat Festival. ."

Compared with traditional spacecraft, Xinghai, which uses an electric propulsion system as its power source, takes longer to climb the gravity well.

But once it enters space, it flies much faster than traditional spacecraft.

The Chang'e series of probes take about 8-14 days to fly from the earth to the moon. For example, Chang'e 1 took more than eight days.

When the United States first manned the moon, Apollo 11, the spacecraft took a total of three and a half days from the earth to the moon.

The three and a half days here refer to the time it took for Apollo 11 to go from the surface to the lunar orbit. If you include the orbiting operation to adjust the moon landing, or the lunar module reaching the lunar surface, it took about more than four days.

For Xinghai, the moon landing process is simpler, faster and takes less time than traditional spacecraft.

After climbing out of the gravity well, it can save orbiting time and go directly to the moon.

Of course, considering that this is the first manned lunar landing project in China, the relevant processes and orbit entry methods still use the experience of the Chang'e spacecraft.

After all, by shortening the time by one or two days, the most important thing is to ensure that the first manned moon landing is completed smoothly and without fail.

But even so, Xinghai has huge advantages in landing time and speed compared to traditional spacecraft.

And if the distance is extended further, such as landing on Mars, Xinghai's advantages will be even greater.

The distance between the earth and the moon is still too short for an electric-propulsion space shuttle, and even theoretically, it is not enough to accelerate it to its maximum flight speed.

After all, in outer space, because there is no air resistance, the spacecraft needs an extremely long braking distance to reduce its speed.

In order to ensure that the space shuttle can successfully enter the lunar orbit, Xinghai also needs to start to reduce its speed halfway and gradually decelerate until it reaches the orbit entry speed before it can officially enter the lunar orbit.

On the other side, the United States.

In the White House, Washington.

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson entered the President's Office under the guidance of the secretary's assistant.

In the room, in addition to the elderly Mr. President, there was also CIA Director William Joseph Burns, wearing a black suit and standing with a sullen expression on his face.

Seeing the two of them, Bill Nelson frowned slightly and quickly walked into the office.

"check it out."

Seeing his arrival, the elderly president sitting behind the desk pushed a document on the table forward and signaled.

Bill Nelson glanced at the documents on the table, then at William Joseph Burns who was standing aside, and picked up the documents from the table with some confusion.

When he saw the information on the document, his pupils suddenly shrank, and he blurted out words of surprise.

"This is impossible!"

Opposite me, the elderly Mr. *** snorted coldly and said: "China has already started the moon landing project. The Xinghai will go to the moon in a week, but what about you? There is no progress at all now! I don't even know Where have you spent all the funds from Congress!”

Taking a deep breath, Bill Nelson calmed himself down and said quickly: "Judging from this information, the moon landing in a week's time is only an unmanned space program. It is impossible for them to land astronauts so soon. We still have time."

Standing aside, CIA Director William Joseph Burns said expressionlessly: "The space shuttle called Xinghai will officially launch manned moon landings on the 21st of next month! What I leave for you The time is less than a month and a half."

Hearing this, Bill Nelson quickly said: "I suspect that this information was released deliberately by the other party. It took only one and a half months to collect experimental data for unmanned moon landings and prepare for manned moon landings. It’s almost impossible.”

"You must know that landing on the moon is a very complicated task and requires countless preparations. They only started collecting data for the first round of unmanned lunar landing experiments a week later. No matter how fast the speed is and no matter how smooth everything goes, the collection of data from the unmanned lunar landing It will take at least half a year from experimental data to manned moon landing."

William Joseph Burns: "You said the same thing about the electric propulsion system last time. They couldn't do it. But the other party's Xinghai took to the sky right under our noses."

Upon hearing this, Bill Nelson quickly retorted: "Whether the propulsion system used by Xinghai is electric propulsion has yet to be confirmed. Moreover, it is your job to collect intelligence, and NASA can only provide some judgment. This mistake is not the right one." It’s up to us to carry it.”

After a pause, he looked at the elderly president sitting behind the office and continued: "Moreover, even if the other party is really sure that they will officially launch the manned moon landing project on June 21, we will still have time!"

"Regarding the Artemis program, we have successfully completed all preparations for the first phase. Whether it is Space-X's BFR super rocket or Lockheed Martin's Orion multi-purpose manned spacecraft, these manned The equipment for the moon landing has been accepted."

"According to the established plan, NASA would originally launch preliminary manned spaceflight activities around July, but now, it is not impossible to advance it to June."

Behind the desk, after hearing Bill Nelson's explanation, the elderly president's gloomy face finally looked better.

He knocked on the spacious mahogany desk and said, "I need to make sure nothing goes wrong! Make sure we can return to the moon before each other!"

Bill Nelson nodded and affirmed: "Of course!"