This star is going to the moon

Chapter 410 The Americans watched helplessly as the Chinese beat them to a chance to land on the moo

Chapter 410 The Americans watched helplessly as the Chinese beat them to a chance to land on the moon!

As Lu Yun watched "Wu Gang 1" land smoothly on the edge of the Sharkton crater, and both lunar rovers drove onto the lunar surface in full operation, he nodded in satisfaction.

Now we don't have to wait for the Indians to "crash and bluff" on the moon.

Although they claim that their Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft will land on the lunar south pole this year, becoming the first country to land on the lunar south pole, there is still no sign of it.

In the previous life, Chandrayaan-3 was delayed for two years.

They even claimed that the moon only landed "near the south pole of the moon" and then insisted that it had landed at the south pole of the moon.

As Lu Yun was thinking about these things, people around him rushed over to shake his hand.

His involvement in space projects inevitably involves live broadcasts, and viewers cheered in the live chat as they saw the bustling command center.

[Haha, I knew Lu Shen would definitely be fine!]

The Long March 10 rocket is a national project, while the "Wu Gang" lander and lunar rover are actually commercial payloads for BlueStar Aerospace's "Lunar Navigation and Resource Exploration" project, similar to how Elon Musk's Crew Dragon spacecraft won the bid for NASA's "Commercial Crew Program."

Goodness, this is so much text blocking the screen!

[The name "Lushen" should be taken a step further, since the lunar rover's name is now part of the Chang'e program, following the naming convention of "Yutu".]

[Haha, who cares? Just a few days ago, some colonists were saying the Americans were amazing, that they had five rovers on Mars, two of which were operational. What do they say now?]

That's right, we also have five lunar rovers on the moon, and three of them are operational!

[Three to two, what can you say? Even if the colonists are stubborn, they can't claim victory, can they?]

That's hard to say, after all, normal people don't understand the logic of colonists.

It's alright. In another three months, we'll land a Mars rover on Mars, giving us four operational rovers on other planets.

Indeed, we can ignore them, but why would "Wu Gang" land at the lunar south pole? Besides setting a new record for "lunar south pole," what other benefits would it bring? I've seen some marketing accounts say that communication there is poor, and they have to rely on the Queqiao satellite relay for communication part of the time.

Don't listen to marketing accounts! Go directly to the official websites of the China National Space Administration and Blue Star Aerospace. They have detailed information there. The Sharkton crater is no ordinary object; there's probably water inside!

Wow, that's pretty impressive...

That's pretty impressive?

That's really impressive!

The Sharkton crater is located within the Antarctic-Aitken Basin...

Yes, the Antarctic-Aitken Basin is the landing site of Chang'e-4, located on the far side of the moon.

Chang'e 4 landed in the Von Kármán crater in the South Pole-Aitken Basin on the far side of the moon.

The Chang'e 6 lunar sample collection mission will also be conducted in the Antarctic-Aitken Basin.

The main problem is that the South Pole-Aitken Basin is too large, with a diameter of 2500 kilometers and an area of 490 million square kilometers, accounting for a quarter of the surface area of the far side of the moon.

Or it's roughly half the land area of China.

You could also say it's the area of 82 Tongliao, or 82 tons!

The South Pole-Aitken Basin covers a quarter of the far side of the Moon, but after covering the lunar south pole, it also extends a small portion onto the near side, where the Sharkton crater is located.

Even the Moon's axis of rotation is located within the Shackleton Crater, just a few kilometers from the center.

The Sharkton crater is 20.92 kilometers in diameter and about 4.2 kilometers deep, which is not particularly large for a lunar crater.

From Earth, only the edge of Shackleton Crater, located on a rough, rugged highland, is visible. Its walls bulge slightly above the lunar surface, and its outer slope shows some impact erosion.

Because the Moon's orbit is tilted only 5° from the ecliptic, the interior of this crater is perpetually dark, resulting in an average internal temperature of approximately 90K, or -183 degrees Celsius. Under these conditions, all water molecules that arrived with the impacting comet would have frozen to the crater's surface or below.

The Lunar Prospector probe once measured hydrogen levels in the Sharkton crater that were much higher than normal on the lunar surface, suggesting the possible presence of water ice.

However, the albedo at the bottom of the crater is consistent with that on the far side of the moon, indicating that there is no exposed surface ice at the bottom of the crater.

Of course, previous detectors had limited detection capabilities, so we cannot be 100% certain.

In addition, the crater is permanently dark, but the peaks surrounding the crater are almost constantly exposed to sunlight, with the time spent in the sun being exposed to the sun accounting for about 80% to 90% of the entire lunar orbital cycle. These continuously illuminated mountains are called "perpetual day peaks".

This is a very important reason why "Wu Gang No. 1" landed here.

In addition, this excellent location is actually an important landing site for NASA's "return to the moon" mission.

Unfortunately, the Chinese beat them to it.

After all, the Americans planned to build a lunar base here in 2020, but it's already 2021 and there's still no sign of it.

To increase the success rate of the landing, "Wu Gang 1" did not land directly at the highest peak of the Sharkton crater, but instead landed in a relatively flat area outside the crater.

The annual sunshine here is less than 90%, barely reaching 80%, which means that the Earth has sunshine for more than 290 days a year and no sunshine for more than 70 days.

Unlike Earth's south pole, the moon's south pole doesn't have an atmosphere that filters and refracts sunlight, causing it to attenuate. As long as solar panels are erected, the moon's south pole receives direct sunlight.

Therefore, the two new Yutu lunar rovers can obtain sufficient energy for scientific exploration!
Their primary objective is to get close to the rim of the Sharkton crater and then try to detect whether there is water inside.

However, the rest of the content will require a paid subscription, so the live stream ends here.

If there is an opportunity, the official team will release some "beautiful pictures of the moon" taken by the lander and lunar rover for everyone to see.

Or wait for the final good news.

It's daytime here in Laos, and many people were watching the live stream while they were relaxing. Now that the live stream is over, they're excitedly looking for people to chat with.

Meanwhile, American netizens who surf the internet at night were in an uproar.

Because the trending topic on Twitter was...

[Just now, China's new unmanned lunar probe landed on the lunar south pole!]

The landing site of the Chinese-made "Wu Gang" probe is one of the landing sites chosen by NASA for its "return to the moon" mission!

[China's unmanned lunar probe lands at NASA's chosen landing site for a future lunar base!]

[Sharkton, the Federation's future lunar base, has been captured!]

[The Chinese have stolen our lunar water resources!]

[Wang Defa?!]

[A generous gift of crabs—have the Chinese invaded?]

[Robbers! They're outright robbers!]

We must launch rockets to retake it and get the Marines to the moon!

This is war! I told you the evil Chinese were going to wage war against us, but you only care about that half-dead Russian!