This star is going to the moon

Chapter 431: Both China and the US have two active Mars rovers, a metaphor for the power of the two countries.

The national aerospace team in the previous era was relatively conservative in terms of live aerospace broadcasts because they were afraid of causing negative impacts after experiencing various failures.

Or perhaps it's that all parties are afraid to take responsibility.

This life is different from the last. Lu Yun has led me to success time and time again, so I am very open to live streaming.

Just like the live broadcast of the Tianwen-1 Mars probe landing.

However, despite being called a live broadcast, it was actually just a pre-made CG video playing on the screens in the command center when the probe landed.

After all, Mars is too far from Earth, and the communication delay at this time is as high as 18 minutes!

So when the pre-production CG on the big screen finished playing and the CG lander successfully landed on the surface of Mars, the command center did not cheer, but remained calm and focused on various news.

An 18-minute wait is not short, so the live broadcast host and guests need to say something.

"...At this point, all we can do is wait. Due to the 18-minute communication delay between Earth and Mars, we cannot provide any real-time instructions regarding Tianwen-1's landing process, so its entire landing operation is automated..."

"...There is currently no information, so there is a certain probability of failure..."

Hearing the guest so frankly say that he would fail, the viewers in the live broadcast room felt that Lao Zhong was indeed confident.

Things are definitely different now; people are saying things like "it will fail" in live streams.

Indeed, I remember that our space broadcasts used to be very conservative.

There was no other way; our space program capabilities weren't very strong at the time, we lacked confidence, and we were afraid of failure.

[It's not just the fear of failure; it's that after each space mission fails during a live stream, there won't be another live stream for a long period of time.]

I remember a long time ago, there was a live broadcast of a space launch where everyone was very confident—it was for launching a foreign satellite—but the rocket just exploded.

Yes, it was that explosion. That failure was a huge blow to my confidence.

Sometimes we should be grateful for failure, because only after failure can we learn from our experiences, avoid repeating the same mistakes, and ultimately inspire the great development of aerospace technology.

[Speaking of which, I find this strange. Lu Yun has always been very successful, yet when he leads projects, he can summarize many lessons learned from failures and then prevent others from making the same mistakes.]

Perhaps this is what genius is all about.

That's what geniuses are like; they probably simulate all sorts of scenarios in their minds.

[Have you ever been a genius? Some of your statements are nonsense and assumptions!]

I've never been a genius, is that really true?

I was the top science student in last year's college entrance exam; I should be considered a genius, and I can attest to that.

Holy crap, there's a pro like this in the livestream!

[Hey, there's some activity in the command center!]

Host: "Okay, we see some activity in the command center. It must have received some... message... Oh, success!"

"Just now at 5:18, the Tianwen-1 lander successfully landed in the pre-selected landing area in the southern part of Utopia Planitia on Mars!"

"After nearly 300 days of flight and a journey of 4 million kilometers, my country's first Mars exploration mission has successfully landed on Mars!"

"We saw the command center cheer briefly before returning to their busy work, because the first real-life image of the Martian surface after the Tianwen-1 lander's landing is being transmitted, and we will see it shortly..."

The staff in the command center need to work diligently, while the viewers in the live broadcast room only need to cheer.

【6666666】

[Awesome!!]

[Haha, the loop and landing were both successful on the first try!]

Technology has truly advanced; what used to require two Mars missions can now be accomplished in a single mission.

[There's a third one coming. I wonder when the two Mars rovers will reach the Martian surface?] [Probably a few more days. Lu Yun is in charge of the "Wind and Fire Wheel" Mars rover, and he didn't come today, so it's definitely not today.]

It usually takes two or three days.

Images of the Martian surface have arrived!

(Real photos of the Martian surface taken by the Mars rover)

Wow, this Martian surface is so Martian!

It's quite amazing, like a sandstorm sweeping across the Gobi Desert in western China.

[Haha, the terrain is a bit like that "Mars base" in western Xinjiang.]

The previous description was inverted; it should be said that the terrain of that "Mars base" resembles this place.

When will we actually be able to establish a Mars base?

We haven't even established a lunar base yet, and they're really dreaming!

[This is a photo of Mars taken by the navigation and terrain camera of the "Nezha" Mars rover after it was powered on.]

[Has the Mars rover started operating yet? Why hasn't it left the lander and gone to the Martian surface today?]

[It's probably undergoing various self-checks. Taking a picture might be part of the camera system's self-check, and the image is simply transmitted back after it's taken.]

That must be it...

The news of the Tianwen-1 Mars lander successfully landing on Mars quickly became a trending topic. Many people felt that China's aerospace technology was very impressive, so it was normal for a mission to complete both orbiting and landing in one go.

Some people were initially quite worried because the Tianwen-1 project was "very aggressive" from the very beginning.

One mission requires completing three tasks: "orbiting, landing, and patrolling"!
Previously, many countries carried out these three projects in three separate phases. In most cases, one detector performed one project, while in a few cases, one detector performed two projects.

Of course, many more probes failed in their missions.

The level mentioned here that failed seems to be incompatible with Mars; it's the main reason why the success rate of Mars exploration missions is less than 50%.

Now that China has begun exploring Mars, the Tianwen-1 probe has increased the success rate of Mars exploration.

Two of the three projects have been successful so far, and the Mars rover should be able to take photos and send them back without much problem, given that China has extensive experience in deploying extraterrestrial exploration rovers.

When news of Tianwen-1's landing reached Earth, it was already 5:30 PM. The news spread most widely during the evening news broadcast, just as dawn was breaking in the United States, where they had also received the news.

However, the general public didn't express much amazement, after all, the US has explored Mars many times before, and just two months ago they landed a nuclear-powered rover and flew a Mars drone.

This doesn't involve winning in the guise of something else; it's a real, tangible win.

NASA, however, stayed up until the early hours of the morning to monitor the situation.

After all, the two countries are currently engaged in a new round of space race, and China's space capabilities have been enhanced to an epic degree. They cannot afford to miss any mission intelligence.

Two days later, the "Nezha" Mars rover and the "Wind and Fire Wheels" Mars rover completed their self-checks, and the lander was in normal condition. So the two Mars rovers drove off the lander through the unfolded tracks and arrived at the surface of Mars.

At this point, the US has two operational Mars rovers, and China also has two operational Mars rovers.

While the American had two nuclear-powered vehicles, weighing 800 kg and 1000 kg respectively, the Chinese had two solar-powered vehicles, weighing 240 kg and 10 kg respectively.

But like aircraft carriers, having one or not is a completely different matter.

The US now has 11 nuclear-powered catapult-equipped aircraft carriers, while China has 2 conventionally powered ski-jump aircraft carriers. However, the US no longer dares to underestimate China as it did before.

Lu Yun also noticed this subtle connection, just as the Americans had one more small drone on Mars than the Chinese, which is analogous to the Americans being slightly better than the Chinese in terms of fighter jets.

In fact, the Chinese are already working on large-scale Mars drones, just like they are secretly working on the sixth generation of ginkgo leaves.

(End of this chapter)