The weather was in good condition on this day, and the endless Pacific Ocean was calm everywhere.

The sea water is bright and blue, and occasionally the sea breeze passes by, causing a shimmering wave.

Kokolas Island is still surrounded by white sand, green trees swaying, and blue sky and blue sea on all sides.

However, this uninhabited island, which has always been peaceful and lonely, has also begun to surging undercurrents today.

At the Pacific Base of the Interstellar Exploration Alliance, in the No. 3 Super Laboratory of the Science Group Aeronautics and Astronautics Research Institute.

A spacecraft with a maximum width of 30 meters is anchored in the center of the Super Laboratory.

This is the new generation of improved starship spacecraft.

At this time, a large number of staff and scientists were gathered in the super laboratory.

"Everything is ready, start shipping." The person who spoke was Dr. Lily, a fellow American from Durunik.

"Okay, start the transmission device." Another staff member pressed the start command.

The ground directly below the Starship Spaceship is a platform that can rotate from multiple angles, and the platform is adjusting the optimal angle.

After the angle is adjusted, the platform is perfectly connected to a straight track leading directly to the core area of ​​the Pacific base.

"The Starship Spaceship is ready to set off and head to the launch site of the core area of ​​the base." The staff continued to issue instructions.

Immediately afterwards, the platform carrying the starship spacecraft began to move along the orbit and towards the core area launch site at a speed that was neither too fast nor too slow.

Half an hour later, the Starship Spacecraft arrived at the core area launch site...

If you look down from the air to Kokolas Island, you can see a large area of ​​sandy and soil open space in the center of the island.

In daily life, there is nothing wrong with this empty sand.

But from early this morning, there were waves of low sounds of mechanical movement coming from deep underground.

Suddenly, accompanied by a strong roar, the entire ground seemed to be gradually being torn apart by huge force.

The cracks between the ground are getting bigger and longer.

But what is surprising is that the sand and stones that originally covered the ground did not collapse everywhere, but disappeared intact with the ground.

If you look closely, you will find clues. It turns out that the sand on this open space is just a rubber model attached to the metal plate.

When the sand is completely hidden around, you can see a large area of ​​fully enclosed deep ferrous metal.

The roar continued, and soon the dark black metal layer split again and disappeared around the same.

At the same time, a huge platform gradually emerged, which was the launch site hidden in the core area of ​​the IEA Pacific Base.

The unsealed launch tower, a giant launch vehicle, and a starship spacecraft are waiting for the launch site one by one.

It is admirable that the design and builders of the IEA underground base. On the one hand, such design greatly increases the confidentiality of the base, and at the same time solves the problem of transporting huge materials such as spacecraft and launch vehicles from the underground base to the ground.

In the past, Hayashi Chen even heard a few scientists speculate that the entire IEA Pacific Base is actually a giant spacecraft that is constantly being built and improved!

Of course, Harashichen considered that the earth did not have such a powerful carrying capacity to send such a huge creature into space.

So, he didn't believe it.

After a whole day of debugging and installation, with the joint efforts of many staff at the IEA Pacific Base.

The tall launch tower finally stood on the launch site, and the Starship Spacecraft was perfectly equipped on the giant launch vehicle.

Taking into account security and stability, environmental protection factors, and the constraints of the International Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Tests.

During this operation, the Pacific Base of the Interstellar Exploration Alliance still plans to use traditional chemical rocket thrusters to transport various components including the Starship Spaceship, detachable nuclear-powered thrusters, Mars residence cabins, and the Spring Moon Mars landing vehicle to Earth orbit, and then complete the assembly work.

At present, the space navigation science and technology organized by the IEA is in an innovative period where nuclear power and traditional chemical propulsion systems alternate.

In essence, the technical level of the nuclear power propulsion system organized by the IEA is still in a relatively early stage.

In order to develop nuclear-powered space propulsion systems, the Interstellar Exploration Alliance specially established the Nuclear Power Research Institute at the end of the 20th century.

After nearly 50 years of hard work, the Nuclear Power Research Institute has finally stepped into the threshold of nuclear-powered space propulsion technology.

The nuclear power system in a spacecraft is incomparable with the nuclear power system on the ground.

When using nuclear propulsion systems in space, a series of issues such as volume, energy consumption, cooling and the health threat of radiation to astronauts must be considered.

NASA (NASA) began researching nuclear-powered thrust rockets as early as the last century, but the United States has not been able to research practical nuclear-powered thrust engines until now. The only result is nuclear-powered ion rockets with smaller thrusts. This kind of thrust is only suitable for use on planetary probes, but it is far from enough for manned interstellar travel.

According to the current scientific and technological level, scientists from the IEA Pacific Base Nuclear Power Research Institute have designed three models for nuclear power propulsion systems:

The first model: Because there is no medium such as water or air in space, according to Newton's third law of motion (action and reaction forces), propellers cannot be used and jets must be used. Therefore, when a large amount of thermal energy is generated in the nuclear reactor, propellants (such as liquid hydrogen) are injected. The propellants will expand rapidly under heat and then spray out at high speed from the tail of the engine to generate thrust. This method is currently the easiest to use, but the actual speed gain effect is limited, and it cannot meet the requirements of ultra-long-distance interstellar travel.

The second model: Nuclear reactors will generate many high-speed moving ions. We use magnetic fields to control the jet direction of these high-energy particles, so that the rocket can produce backlash motion. The advantage of this method is that the push is extremely large than the anomaly, without carrying any medium, and has strong sustainability. Unfortunately, it is still difficult to effectively control these high-energy particles with existing technical capabilities. Therefore, NASA has spent so many years and has only developed a suitable use of nuclear-energy ion rockets on planetary probes.

The third model: This is the simple, direct and rough acceleration method designed by the IEA Nuclear Power Research Institute - using a controllable "nuclear explosion".

This is a very bold and crazy way. In this model, it is no longer a controlled nuclear reaction, nor does it need to be considered whether it is nuclear fusion or nuclear fission. Because in space, there is no essential difference between the total amount of backlash caused by stable nuclear fusion and nuclear explosions.

Using stable and controllable "nuclear explosions" to promote the spacecraft, this propulsion system is called the [nuclear pulse propulsion system] by the IEA Nuclear Power Research Institute.

[Nuclear Pulse Propulsion System] In theory, like the rough metaphor of Dean Watt of the Institute of Astrophysics, "We must complete one nuclear explosion after another behind the spacecraft like igniting Chinese firecrackers."

However, in actual operation, extremely delicate technical means must be relied upon, and the complexity is simply unimaginable to ordinary people.

In the [Nuclear Pulse Propulsion System] designed by the IEA Nuclear Power Research Institute, the nuclear fuel loaded in the power system is refined into a large number of micro-equivalent nuclear fuel units with precision, and then combined according to matrix methods. During actual flight, it releases and detonates one by one in the propulsion disk at the stern of the spacecraft according to needs to generate continuous and powerful propulsion energy. This method is simple, direct and crude, but the acceleration effect of the spacecraft is very significant, and the requirements for the controllable degree of nuclear reaction are relatively low.

In addition, the IEA Aerospace Research Institute has also designed a reliable isolation device specifically between the nuclear power propulsion system and the spacecraft control center. Although this design greatly increases the weight of the spacecraft, it can ensure that astronauts will not be affected by radiation and high heat from the [nuclear pulse propulsion system].

On the launch site of the core area of ​​the IEA Pacific Base.

After completing the final inspection and operation before takeoff, professional engineering and technicians quickly evacuated the launch site.

The first to be sent to Earth orbit is a new generation of starship spacecraft equipped with traditional propulsion systems and the latest nuclear power systems.

In this launch mission, except for Keanu Reeves, the pilot of the Mars landing vehicle of the Spring Moon (the Mars residence cabin will be sent to Earth orbit without a pilot), all other astronauts and scientists involved in this Mars exploration have entered the starship spacecraft in turn.

Harashi Chen and others have made final preparations before launch according to the posture required during training.

"God, I'm really a little excited when I went to space for the first time." Durunik said with an excited look on his face.

"You will feel good when you launch it later. Your mouth is closed and you are not allowed to speak from now on. You will definitely not want to try the feeling of air compressing your lungs!" Team leader Frank turned his head and looked at Durunik, then ordered.

"clear."

Yuan Hashichen, who was standing aside, also adjusted his posture slightly and tried his best to calm down his emotions.

............

Located at the Central Command Center of the Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, the directors of various institutes and other major leaders of the Pacific Base have long gathered here.

At the underground launch control center, Gianna, the director of the Aerospace Research Institute, who serves as the commander of this launch mission, is staring at the countdown time indication system of the electronic screen and listening carefully to each test value reported by personnel in each position.

"Ten minutes to prepare"...

"Five minutes to prepare"...

"One minute preparation"...

"Set off!!"

Jaina gave the start command with a serious look on her face and a solemn tone.

As soon as he finished speaking, there was a continuous loud roar from the launching field.

The strongest launch vehicle in history sprayed brilliant flames at the tail, showing its power that shook the sky and the earth, rising from the ground, breaking through the clouds and fog, and going straight to the sky.

The Rockets soared up in the blue sky, gradually becoming a small highlight, penetrated through the atmosphere and disappeared from people's vision.

At the same time, dozens of sets of communication equipment placed around the world are accurately measuring, recording and reporting the launch vehicle's flight speed, altitude and attitude at every moment.

"Working normally!" "Flight normally!"...

In the flight control center, the automatic recorder continuously depicts the curve of the launch vehicle's flight trajectory on the display screen.

"Successfully entered the pre-determined orbit around the earth!"

As the news of victory came from the monitoring center, the entire IEA Pacific Base suddenly echoed with endless applause...

(To be continued) (Everyone is welcome to join the book friend exchange group: 529839423)
Chapter completed!