This star is going to the moon

Chapter 510 Racing Against Time to Land on the Moon, "The Wandering Earth 2: The Ladder Crisis" Breaks Records
The more NASA engineers calculated, the more something seemed off.

"Guys, we're in trouble!"

"Yes, the time buffer we previously estimated that could be used for postponement... may no longer exist!"

"We did not expect the progress of the Lao-China manned lunar landing project to be so fast. Not only did the Long March 10 heavy rocket and the Mengzhou lunar spacecraft make their maiden flight in July, but the lunar lander, lunar suit and lunar rover also have prototype products."

"Yes, we calculated the progress based on our own Artemis Project and knew that the Chinese would be faster, and even faster with Lu Yun joining. But even with all that, we still underestimated their speed."

Upon hearing this, several key members of the plan fell silent.

Based on the progress of the Artemis Project...

While others may not know the progress of the Artemis Project, they know it perfectly well!
In fact, the Artemis return-to-the-moon plan that is known to the outside world, and even to those not part of the core team, has been manipulated by them.

Just like the wet rehearsal for the SLS rocket, according to the plan, one wet rehearsal is enough to schedule the maiden flight in early May.

Firstly, theoretically, there are no problems with the rocket, and according to the schedule, it should have its maiden flight in May.

Secondly, the cost of launching an SLS rocket has increased from $20 billion to $40 billion!
A wet rehearsal involves rehearsing all aspects of the event except for ignition and takeoff. It requires a significant amount of resources and personnel, so it is quite expensive. NASA doesn't have the funds to schedule multiple wet rehearsals.

The more they tried to avoid trouble, the more trouble happened; the wet rehearsal was cancelled after three attempts.

The core personnel were aware of the problems with the SLS rocket, and they were hoping to find some minor issues during the wet rehearsal so that they could be easily fixed without delaying the maiden flight in May.

You won't know until you try, and once you try, you'll be surprised.

This is way too much of a problem!
Of course, the core personnel are not panicked; they have various ways to shirk responsibility.

And it's a matter of "you have to have it whether you want it or not," because there are no other rockets that can take on the mission of Artemis's return to the moon; only the SLS rocket can be used.

Despite the heated online debate about whether Elon Musk's 9-meter diameter rocket is feasible, the SLS rocket has at least been built, while Musk's "Super Falcon" rocket is still in the prototype stage.

The most important thing is that the prototype kept exploding, which was terrifying to watch.

Can anyone be sure that the Super Falcon rocket is definitely faster than the SLS rocket?

If the changes are made and the final result is still not as good as the SLS rocket's progress, who will take responsibility?

So the SLS rocket has a lot of problems, but at least for now, no one can shake its position or take over.

Let the core team continue.

The core team still maintains the same attitude: "You have to take it whether you want it or not!"

The SLS rocket failed its previous rehearsal and will need to undergo a new one. Unlike Boeing's Starliner commercial spacecraft, it won't pay for a new test itself; instead, it will need to seek funding from Congress.

After all, the SLS rocket is a national mission.

So if you want the SLS rocket to make its maiden flight sooner, then you'll have to pay up.

We worked overtime to check and fix the problems.

Now is the time to race against time to land on the moon with China. The Federation, you don't want China to be the first to land on the moon this century, do you?

The federal government is like a trapped leek, with sunk costs that are too high, so it can only obediently pour money into it.

Anything that needs to be discussed can only be addressed after this space race is over.

They were discussing the moon when the live broadcast of the Xiancha space shuttle docking with the Tiangong space station came on, which was another headache for them.

Putting aside the space shuttle issue, the X-33 single-stage-to-orbit space shuttle, which was hastily put together, is already undergoing manned modifications. Its structural framework is already finalized, and adding windows would take a lot of time, so they simply abandoned real windows and used ultra-high-definition displays to disguise them.

You can even brag about this to others.

"Spaceships without portholes have better overall integrity and rigidity, and are also safer!"

However, the X-33 was not originally designed for manned operation, so there were still many problems to be solved when it was converted to manned mode.

Even if that problem is solved, it will still be far behind the Kite-class space shuttle.

As a result, it was already too late to catch up, but now the Lao-China space agency's "Xiancha" has gone a step further, docking with the space station just two hours after takeoff!
You should know that what we usually call "fast connection" takes more than six hours, so a three-hour connection is considered "lightning fast"!

As a result, the Laos and the Chinese have now held another two-hour meeting!

But that wasn't all. Soon after, the Fairy Chariot showed them a skill that was "fastest ever".

Balance the air pressure in fifteen minutes!

Then the doors to the space station were opened, and the two groups of astronauts successfully reunited.

NASA technicians see faster technology, while Space Force personnel see military applications.

After all, speed is crucial in many military matters.

So they asked, "Can the X-33 be that fast?"

"..."

The successful docking of the "Xiancha" spacecraft with the Tiangong space station is very important to China's space officials, but not so much to netizens. The information released at the Space Day event is more important.

Besides the "manned lunar landing package," there's also the Chang'e 6 probe, which will be launched early next month and will bring back the first soil sample from the far side of the moon.

This is a truly significant flagship space mission!
Furthermore, the Chang'e 6 mission in May was just the beginning; there will be flagship-level space missions every month for the next two or three months.

For example, in June, Bluestar Aerospace Company has a major mission: launching the core module of a space hotel.

It will be humanity's first space station to operate purely commercially!

It is also the place where Lu Yun and An Fangfei got married.

July marks the maiden flight of the Long March 10 heavy-lift rocket, which will be the true starting point for China and Laos to manned lunar landing.

The highlights of this Space Day event sparked discussions for several days until the end of the month when "The Wandering Earth 2: The Ladder Crisis," which had been showing for three months, was taken off the screens.

Its domestic box office reached a staggering 122.8 billion yuan!
Wow, I used to think that 90 billion yuan in domestic box office revenue would be a great achievement, and that everyone could work together to push it to 100 billion. Turns out I was too naive.

Indeed, it's surprising that our domestic market could actually support a single film grossing over 10 billion yuan.

Hey, hey, hey, don't omit that "small fraction" of 22.8 billion! It's 122.8 billion for a single film!

[Haha, indeed, even a fraction of the box office revenue from "The Ladder 2" represents the ultimate box office dream for many films!]

[Damn, forget about a fraction of 20 billion; many low-budget films are lucky to get 2.8 million.]

[Haha, I know there are many big-budget films that flopped without even reaching 2.8 million at the box office...]

(End of this chapter)