Baikonur Space Center. Pen & Fun & Pavilion www.biquge.info

The great war in the Mediterranean did not affect here, the whole Soviet Union was still very peaceful, and even now they did not have to be afraid of nuclear deterrence.

As the largest space center in the Soviet Union, it was very busy.

In particular, in the rocket assembly workshop, the Energy rocket is being assembled rapidly.

This year is a heavy year for the Soviet space industry, and the Soviet Union will launch 11 Energia rockets, complete the construction of the Mir orbital space station, complete the networking of space laser cannons in space, and complete the complete occupation of space.

The outer space of the Earth, is Soviet!

At the same time, another project is also being carried out in an intense and orderly manner.

Baikonur, the largest space center in the Soviet Union, in addition to carrying out launch missions, also performs more tracking and control tasks, where there are five large and small monitoring and control stations, and other tracking and control stations around the world, linked together, together to form a huge monitoring and control network.

And now, in a tracking and control center, some experts are looking at the complex data on the computer screen, and analyzing the flight characteristics of the spacecraft from it, is it normal?

A tall, thin man with a serious expression stood aside, and at this time, his mood was quite nervous.

For Chelomian, a Soviet astronaut, landing on Mars was the goal that he tirelessly pursued in the back half of his body, and now, it was the first attempt!

Mars, which is far away from the Earth, has an uncertain distance from the Earth, and the orbits of both sides are elliptical.

Mars probes departing from Earth are not always ready to be launched, but only once every 2 years and 2 months, and such launches are called launch windows. At this time, the Sun, Earth, and Mars will line up in a straight line, called the Mars opposition, and this is a good opportunity to launch a Mars probe.

Because, at this time, the distance between Mars and the Earth is the closest, of course, this closest distance is also varied, it is generally believed that the closest distance is about 55 million kilometers, and the farthest distance is more than 400 million kilometers.

If this launch is successful, then wait a few more years, and by the next time, that is, in 88, the distance between Mars and the Earth will be the closest again, about 58.8 million kilometers.

The speed of radio waves is 300,000 kilometers per second, so even a radio that is already fast to the speed of light will take 3 minutes!

Now the signal received came from the distant Mars three minutes ago!

This experiment is very important! Now, the landing signal that you are still receiving, in fact, the Mars probe has landed on Mars, or has crashed!

Mars rover!

When a nuclear-powered engine is used, it can be accelerated all the time, and the time required for Mars exploration has been greatly reduced, and it can be visited in between a month and a half and two months.

And the current Mars rover, is the first attempt, from Baikonur, after being sent into space by the Proton rocket, out of the earth, this Mars probe, relying on the tail of the nuclear-powered rocket engine, continued to speed up, it took forty-one days, finally came to Mars!

After being captured by the gravitational pull of Mars, one of the most important steps, and at the same time the most dangerous one, is to land on Mars!

Even on Earth, the return of the spacecraft is quite dangerous, and in later generations, Columbia had an accident on the return voyage!

And on Mars, far from the Earth, it was impossible for Soviet astronauts to remotely control the probe, and everything was programmed to fly.

Like Earth, Mars has an atmosphere, and the rover enters the Martian atmosphere from an altitude of 131 kilometers at a speed of up to 6 kilometers per second, and it takes just seven minutes to reduce the speed of the rover to zero and achieve a safe landing.

This is also the key moment with the greatest technical difficulty and the highest probability of failure among all Mars exploration missions, and it is a veritable "black seven minutes".

In the initial stage, the initial deceleration must be carried out by parachute, and the main step is the deceleration plan at the end, when it comes into contact with the Martian ground.

Even on Earth, this is the most difficult, for example, Gagarin, the first to go to heaven, although he came down from the sky, in the final stage, did not stay in the spacecraft. Gagarin was ejected from the ejection seat at a height of several hundred meters above the ground when the spacecraft had opened its parachute, and he himself rode in his own parachute, and finally landed.

Internationally, there are three main schemes for the landing of Mars probes, one is airbag buffering. Before the lander lands on the surface of Mars, the airbag that wraps the lander is inflated and deployed, and the lander, like a bouncing ball, is constantly bouncing on Mars, gradually reducing its altitude to achieve a successful landing.

However, this scheme is only suitable for the landing of lightweight landers.

At the same time, the probe stretches out more than four legs, and there is a buffer device on the legs, and the landing is the same as that of the Apollo lunar spacecraft, which is suitable for the landing of heavier landers, and the landing site can be accurately selected.

The other is aerial crane landing.

In later generations, the United States launched the 3.6-ton Curiosity rover to Mars, because it was too heavy and had to be used in a special way. When the Curiosity rover entered the Martian atmosphere at a high speed of 20,000 kilometers per hour, it was loaded in a shield-shaped thermal shield.

When the probe is 11 kilometers above the surface of Mars, it first opens a huge parachute to reduce its flight speed, and after 24 seconds, the thermal shield is disengaged. When the probe descended to an altitude of 1.4 km, the back shell separated, and the eight braking rockets on the probe ignited, slowing the descent speed from 80 meters per second to 0.75 meters per second by rocket thrust reversing.

The speed was already very low, and when the probe was 20 meters above the surface of Mars, the lander was almost "hovering" in the air, and the aerial crane released a nylon rope to lift the Curiosity rover from the lander to the surface of Mars to achieve landing.

Curiosity eventually came out unscathed and launched experiments on Mars.

And now, for the Mars probe launched by the Soviets, the second option is used, because the nuclear-powered rocket engine will provide sufficient recoil power!

No camera will capture its descent, the nuclear-powered rocket ignites for two seconds, adjusts its orbit, and follows an arc to the Martian atmosphere.

In the red Martian atmosphere, the Mars rover, with more brilliant colors, fell down, its surface, and the atmosphere of fire friction, became dark, at an altitude of 11 kilometers from the surface of Mars, the huge parachute opened, the speed of the Mars probe, further reduced!

After swaying and flying for dozens of seconds, the parachute on the top was cut off, the nuclear-powered engine in the tail section, a blazing flame came out, and liquid hydrogen was heated in the reactor and spewed out.

Keep slowing down!

Around, the four legs stretched out, and the probe, with further deceleration, continued to get closer and closer to the surface of Mars.

Finally, the outriggers came into contact with the earth, and the hydraulic cylinder was squeezed and the balance was restored again.

The engine has been turned off and the probe has landed successfully!

On the side of the probe, a camera slowly stretched out, it looked at the world curiously, desolate, everywhere there was a little yellowish red, and the sun on the horizon was just a bright spot that looked white.

When this image was transmitted back to the earth, in an instant, everyone in the measurement and control center couldn't help but applaud!

Cheromian was even more excited, and he succeeded!

This success proves the huge advantages of nuclear-powered rockets in the exploration of Mars! This can significantly reduce the time! Then, next, it is necessary to steadily advance the plan for a manned landing on Mars!

Use the Energia rocket to put a manned Mars rover into orbit, and in orbit, receive another rocket, or propellant refueling from the Mir space station, so that the behemoth with a total mass of more than 200 tons can fly to Mars!

At the same time, there needs to be another spacecraft of the same kind to fly to Mars together, and this spacecraft is mainly used for return!

The whole project will cost a lot of money! Fortunately, Marshal Andrei is fully supportive!