Chapter 792 The World Witnesses Again

If you want to understand the difference between the advantages and disadvantages of electric propulsion and chemical propulsion, you must first understand a concept that junior high school students understand, that is acceleration.

On a shorter distance scale, because of the huge thrust of the chemical propulsion method, the spacecraft can reach a high speed in a short period of time, so overall it is more advantageous in terms of flight time.

However, if the distance scale is enlarged to millions of kilometers, or even tens of millions of kilometers, it is another situation.

Although electric propulsion cannot erupt the working medium in a short period of time in exchange for a huge thrust like chemical propulsion, it can obtain a speed much greater than that of chemical rockets through continuous acceleration and by virtue of its huge specific impulse. maximum value.

Therefore, for the BFR rocket, it will take 3 months to travel to Mars across a distance of tens of millions of kilometers.

But for the Xiaguang rover, which starts directly from lunar orbit, one month is enough.

This is still in the case of missing the optimal launch window period of the Hohmann transfer orbit. If the relative position of Mars and the Earth happens to be at the optimal launch position, it may take less than a month to complete a mission from the moon to Mars. flight.

In a deep and dark space, Xiaguang, which delivered the stationed astronauts of the Moon Palace to their destinations and completed the supply of working fluid, is slowly separating from the Moon Palace space station.

Sitting in the cockpit, Xu Zhenghong reached out and pressed the helmet, and reported to the ground command center in a clear voice.

"This is the Xiaguang. We have completed all flight missions and request the next step."

"This is the ground command and command center. Congratulations on completing all tasks. Now please switch to cruise mode and wait for the next step."

"Got it, switching to cruise mode."

Sitting in the co-pilot seat, looking at Xu Zhenghong who switched to cruise mode, Liu Biao asked casually.

"Aren't you heading back directly?"

"Ground Command told us to wait."

"Because of those Americans?"

"Yes."

Speaking of this matter, Liu Biao couldn't help feeling a burst of emotion in his heart.

About two or three months ago, they had met each other from afar in outer space orbit.

At that time, I didn't have time to say hello, so I watched them fly away.

I didn't expect to meet again soon, but in this form.

There was a moment of silence in the cockpit.

Just when Xu Zhenghong half closed his eyes and was about to sleep for a while, the signal light in the cockpit suddenly flickered slightly.

Liu Biao opened his mouth to remind: "The signal from the ground command center."

"I see," opened his half-closed eyes, Xu Zhenghong sat up straight from the chair, stretched out his hand and pressed on the helmet, "This is Xiaguang, heading to the scheduled airspace, ready to switch routes..."

"5, 4, 3, 2, 1... Ignition!"

The faint blue arc is ejected from the five electric propulsion engines of the Xiaguang, dragging the silver spaceship, and heading towards the distant and endless sea of ​​stars...

...

15 minutes ago.

In this dilemma, the White House finally made a choice. At the same time, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs received a call from the President of the United States, and during the call, the President of the United States formally requested for rescue.

Ten minutes ago, the news reached the space launch center, and the staff who finished the navigation work immediately returned to their jobs.

At almost the same time, Xiaguang, which was performing missions in lunar orbit, received the news and immediately launched a preparatory plan. After the Moon Palace space station completed the supply of working fluid and living materials, it followed the route calculated by the ground command center in advance. Passage to Mars.

It took less than 15 minutes from receiving the rescue request to the departure of the rescue team.

At this moment, the world has once again witnessed efficiency.

At the same time, the Lunar Orbit Construction Committee held a press conference at the Grand Hotel, and publicly reported the latest progress of the rescue operation to reporters from major media.

This move almost made the United States spit blood out of anger.

What about doing things in a low-key manner?

Why did you even invite the reporters!

Originally, the White House planned to handle it in a low-key manner, but it turned out that it did not expect that it would be carried out with great fanfare, holding a press conference and reporting the rescue progress to all walks of life in real time.

In particular, the rescue plan launched within 15 minutes immediately made the staff of the NASA Ares Project Ground Command Center blush.

It took them three days to analyze the various options and the possible results, but no one in charge told them whether they could save it or not, so that they missed the best window for launch.

As a result, there was no budget assessment there, and the channel was determined and a rescue team was dispatched in less than 15 minutes, blowing them up by more than one street in terms of efficiency.

Although they also knew that this rescue plan was definitely not made within 15 minutes, and it might have been prepared before that video call, or even three days before.

But even so, this efficiency is enough to make them beyond their reach.

Not only that, the open, transparent, serious and responsible attitude shown in the "humanitarian" rescue is in stark contrast to NASA's previous prevarication. For a while, all the staff of the Ares Plan ground command center And those who supported the Ares project felt ashamed, and the direction of public opinion changed overnight.

[I am ashamed of NASA. 】

[Unbelievable, if it weren't for people, we don't even know what happened to our colonists on Mars? ! Is the White House planning to wait for their bodies to weather before sending someone up to collect them? 】

[Send a rescue team within 15 minutes...God, how is this possible! 】

[Don't tell me the difficulty of rescue, I now seriously suspect that NASA has no intention of saving people at all! 】

【Until now, I don’t know why "The Martian Diary" was stopped. It’s not because of the high cost of communication, nor because of the dust storms on Mars. It’s purely because our White House and NASA want to hide the truth...】

In order to save face and at the same time show its determination to take its own citizens home, after realizing the seriousness of the matter, the White House urgently announced that it would bear the entire budget of the rescue plan.

However, within five minutes of the announcement, NASA received a bill from across the Pacific Ocean.

A total of 1.7 billion US dollars.

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After seeing this bill, Director Carson was almost out of anger.

$1.7 billion!

Nima can rebuild a Xiaguang!

Is this using him as a cash machine?

At this moment, his assistant walked over from the side.

"gentlemen……"

"What's wrong?"

Looking at Director Carson with a bad face, the assistant hesitated for a moment, then said hesitantly.

"A bad news..."

Looking at the mother-in-law's subordinates, Carson said impatiently: "Stop talking nonsense, talk quickly."

"Yes!" Seeing the boss's impatient expression, the assistant hurriedly nodded and said, "...Just half an hour ago, we found out on the official media website that they also released a documentary program."

Upon hearing these words, Chief Carson's heart skipped a beat, secretly feeling bad.

But where did this bad feeling come from, he couldn't tell.

Opening his mouth, he asked in a forced voice.

"What documentary?"

The assistant smiled bitterly.

"The name seems to be... The Martian."

Carson: "..."

He doesn't want to say anything now except for a fark...