Six months later, Deep Space has successfully arrived at planet GB131!
The curvature engine gradually extinguished, and the hull emerged from the curvature bubble. Immediately afterwards, the ion engine started, and the entire spacecraft tried to stay in the synchronous orbit of the GB131 planet, maintaining the same rotation period as the entire planet.
GB131 itself is not as big as the moon, and there are no satellites around it, so there is no tidal friction.
The consequence of the absence of tidal friction is that... the rotation speed of the planet is quite fast, and it can rotate once in about eight hours. According to various data, the synchronous orbit of the spacecraft is approximately 8,800 kilometers above the ground, with a linear speed of 2,182 meters/second.
In the captain's room, a group of people were paying close attention to the synchronized mission of the spacecraft.
This kind of mission should not be difficult for Deep Space, so everyone is not nervous, but has some lively discussions with each other. When coming to a new planet, people always have a sense of curiosity, excitement and uniqueness
desire to explore.
Many scientists of subsequent generations left the planet Nix for the first time, so they were particularly excited.
They have vaguely observed the unique features of this planet through astronomical telescopes.
Of course, this uniqueness is definitely a good thing for mankind!
The ion flame is constantly changing from strong to weak.
The entire spacecraft flew around the planet twice and finally reached the expected orbit, successfully maintaining a relatively stationary state with the planet.
Distance from the ground, 8800 kilometers!
"Hey, when we originally designed the spacecraft, it would have been nice if it could have stayed on the planet. It would have greatly accelerated our mining mission." A scientist complained.
"It's impossible. The material science at that time was not so advanced...it couldn't support the mass of the spacecraft itself at all."
"And building a spacecraft that can land on planets will greatly increase the amount of work."
"I don't know if current nanomaterials are feasible..."
Yu Yifeng coughed a few times, interrupting the heated discussion.
"Okay everyone, this synchronization work has been successfully completed... Each department carefully checked the operating status of the spacecraft, retrieved and analyzed the complete records of this voyage!"
"After completion, report the results to me as soon as possible."
Yu Yifeng gave orders calmly, with a hint of excitement in his heart, "Now, I announce that the first planetary landing detection work has officially started!"
"The captain ordered that the first landing detection work be started!"
With an order, the Deep Space's tail slowly opened a hole, and "whoosh" launched sixteen detection satellites.
After that, a hundred small exploration spacecraft were launched one after another and flew out quickly from the Deep Space's cabin.
As usual, drones will first detect this unknown planet.
They will detect the specific topography of the planet, collect rock and soil samples, and test whether there are any microorganisms... Even in the interstellar civilization, microbial prevention and control work is still necessary.
"To be fair, this planet is even more hostile than the moon. It has no atmosphere, water, and geothermal heat. At certain times, the radiation from the star is so terrifyingly high that even microorganisms can hardly survive."
"Yes, the illumination of the double stars is too strong, and even tardigrades cannot survive here. Moreover, the orbit of this planet is not circular, and the temperature difference changes even more drastically..."
Having said that, for the sake of caution, people still follow the established safety rules step by step... Even Alien Black believes that such rules are strict enough.
All weapons on the Deep Space are in a semi-activated state. If there is any emergency, they will fire without mercy. The central computer is also processing various information, trying to find anything suspicious.
After a hundred small shuttles landed safely, the cabin door opened, and rows of robots immediately ran out.
Each spacecraft carried more than a hundred, and there were as many as 10,000 in total.
The planet will be fully explored by these robots.
Because there is no geological activity on the planet, the ground here is quite flat. Except for large and small craters, there are not many undulations elsewhere.
The environment of the planet is somewhat similar to that of the moon.
However, with the passage of time and the huge temperature difference, the surface soil became quite sparse. The robot drove past, leaving traces of tracks and swirling dust...
The detection lights on the top of each robot's head are turned on, illuminating the entire ground, and then taking videos along the way and transmitting a large amount of data back to the computing center.
The central computer works quickly to search for suspicious areas, and at the same time directs the robot to move, detect or collect specimens.
Everyone got busy quickly.
In three days of exploration, these 10,000 intelligent robots almost explored the entire world, and then reported the final results to the captain's office.
Everyone's face is filled with cheerful smiles.
Yu Yifeng took a gentle breath: "No trace of life was found! No microorganisms!"
"What a rare metal planet. It actually has a lot of iron, nickel... and silver, gold and other precious metals? There is even a lot of uranium ore! It's really amazing... a metal planet... there is such a thing in the universe.
planet."
Xu Yunjin, who was standing in front, said with a smile: "If this planet could replace the moon, people would really rush there to pan for gold..."
"There is a lot of gold here, and the budget for the moon base will increase significantly!"
The mass of this planet is about one-eighth that of the Earth, similar to the moon, but its density is 1.6 times that of the moon. Because of its special formation conditions, the entire planet has gathered a large amount of metal minerals!
Most of the helium element is concentrated in ilmenite-rich soil with particles smaller than 50 microns.
There is no magnetic field on the surface of this planet, and the temperature difference between day and night is large, which will filter out ordinary helium elements. Coupled with suitable adsorption materials, it is simply a natural helium-3 collector!
Scientists estimate that people could collect around billions of tons of helium-3!
Billions of tons, even if it is only one billion tons, it is too much for human beings!
Helium-3 fusion produces powerful energy, which can meet humanity's current energy needs with only a few dozen tons per year.
One billion tons is simply too much.
Therefore, humans must not miss this opportunity.
"Deep Space is operating normally!"
"The losses of each reactor, curvature engine, and ion engine are as follows:..."
As a series of test reports appeared, Yu Yifeng read them carefully.
In the end, he finally felt relieved that there was no big mistake in the Deep Space, which also meant that... mankind has completely mastered the means of medium and long-distance interstellar navigation!
A treasure mountain is before people's eyes. Now people just need to keep mining and developing!
A group of scientists were also eager to discuss the conditions for the formation of this strange planet. For them, exploring and discovering the unknown is always the most exciting thing.
One of the astronomers talked eloquently: "Have you discovered it? This kind of planet is very much like the inner core of a planet! As we all know, the earth's core is mainly composed of iron and nickel metal, and the radius of the earth's core is about 3,500 kilometers.
.”
"If... we cut off the outer crust and mantle of the Earth, leaving only the core, it will be a completely enhanced version of a metallic planet."
"In this regard, I estimate that this metallic planet should be the remains of a collision between two planets a long time ago. The collision was not too violent, so part of the core was preserved... and then evolved into this metallic planet.
"
"So...where did the rest of the shell go?" another person asked.
"It may be that another planet was formed... it should be this one, right? It may also have become the asteroid belt here." The young scientist pointed at a starry sky photo.
The smaller planets in this area are quite dense, and there is a gas planet similar to Neptune farther away, with a cloud age like the rings of Saturn around it. So what this astronomer said makes sense.
All in all, the discovery of this metallic planet makes everyone extremely happy!
This is simply a treasure from heaven!
So much so that Yu Yifeng immediately made up his mind to establish a large number of mining bases on this metal planet! Not only mining helium-3, but also large amounts of uranium, lithium, titanium, zirconium, silver and other rare metals!
After all, mankind has not yet achieved small-scale nuclear fusion. Except for Deep Space, other aircraft still use conventional power, so the more things like uranium ore, the better!
He definitely doesn't want too much energy. After all, the uranium mines on the planet Nyx have been mined almost completely, and humans haven't gotten much.
There is also gold and silver, which are some industrial materials. Of course, the more the better...