Luo Jia was pleased with the progress of the ion propulsion project, and after testing the performance himself, he set off for Weigu Island, while Cao Yuan went directly north to Inner Mongolia to meet with Bumobei, the person in charge of the company's No. 2 project, to further improve the practical application of the ion thruster in the starship project.

Swish~

When the plane landed on Weigu Island, the heat wave was raging, and Luo Jia felt that it was about to be ignited, so he unbuttoned his shirt and gasped for air.

Since Weigu Island is an overseas leased land, not Chinese territory, there is no air bus system, so Luo Jia had to change jets in Sanya.

As the saying goes, it is easy to go from thrift to luxury, and it is difficult to go from luxury to thrift, now on the earth, there are two completely different transportation systems, after getting used to the speed of air bus, the two-hour flight makes Luo Jia feel unbearable, if there is no way, he does not want to go abroad at all.

You say he's lazy, or he lacks romantic taste, anyway, as soon as he goes abroad, Luo Jia feels uncomfortable, has inconvenient transportation, has to take cash change when he buys things, and holds a handful of dirty banknotes in his hand, Luo Jia feels as if he has returned to the primitive society, the era of barter.

"You're getting squeamish now." An Ran came up with a Panama straw hat and a smile, and when he saw Luo Jia's helpless expression, he couldn't help but laugh.

Luo Jia glanced at him, and then raised his hand to look at the temperature displayed on the watch, "The ground temperature is close to forty degrees, and the aliens can't stand it, and big data also supports me." ”

"If you are afraid of heat, you say you are afraid of heat, what does it have to do with big data?" An Ran muttered, and casually handed Luo Jia a Panama straw hat, although the name of this thing is foreign, it is an authentic Guangzhou product, the brim is very wide, and the sun is breathable.

Huaxia's in-depth research on fluid mechanics has run through all aspects, and this hat is an improved version optimized with Xingchen industrial software, and the air flow will generate microcirculation inside the hat, taking away excess heat.

Luo Jia smiled slightly, "You don't know this, the Academy of Social Sciences has recently conducted a large-scale survey, and found that since the popularization of Xingchen bus, Chinese people have become more and more reluctant to go abroad, and the number of people traveling to Europe and the Americas has plummeted. ”

"Big data shows that now not only do I can't stand the bad traffic and hate traveling abroad, but people all over the country are becoming more and more picky and prefer to stay in developed and convenient domestic vacations."

An Ran said: "Isn't this exactly your goal?" Vigorously develop domestic tourism, everyone in the province runs outside, and now travel in the country is not only convenient, but also cheap, the service is a group of robots, dedicated and cute. ”

"If you want me to say, this is very good, in the past, we used to travel to other people's places in vain, not to mention spending money, and we were looked down upon by others, how aggrieved, now it's okay, please don't go to us."

The two of them had already entered the terminal while talking, and the air conditioning in the terminal was turned on sufficiently, which made people comfortable, coupled with the fatigue of the journey, and some thirst, Luo Jia decided to drink a glass of juice before going to the base.

They came to the café on the first floor, Luo Jia ordered chilled coconut water, An Ran ordered passion fruit, and the two found a corner and chatted about the changes in the past two years.

Science and technology change the world, the road to the stars and the sea, this kind of topic is the existence that Luo Jia and Enron are most interested in, as for the Chinese people who don't like to travel to Thailand now, the Thai girl is very hurt, etc., in fact, it is just their pastime after tea and dinner.

"There's a problem that we have to pay attention to." An Ran suddenly changed his words and said very seriously: "It's November now, the temperature on Weigu Island is still unbearable, and the temperature in the cold area is terrible, the Australian fires are still raging, volcanoes are still erupting everywhere, earthquakes are becoming more and more frequent, all the data is telling us that Mother Earth is going crazy again." ”

"yes." Luo Jia couldn't help but sigh, "The horror of nature is that it is unpredictable, some people say that the earth is warming, but at the same time, there are scientists who predict that the earth will enter a cold ice age, and in the eyes of geologists, frequent earthquakes and volcanic eruptions seem to carry hints of intensified plate movements." ”

"All the pre-research seems to make sense, but no one can make a truly accurate judgment, everyone is just guessing, including us, and we don't know what the future holds, compared to the opponent of nature, North America and the West can only be regarded as pediatrics."

An Ran stretched out his arms and made a helpless look, "The strength of human beings in the face of nature is still very small, maybe you are right, this is not a question of whether we want to change nature, but if we can't change nature, we will perish, all the creatures that ruled the earth before human beings, such as dinosaurs, they all have a common characteristic, that is, they are all dead." ”

Luo Jia and An Ran chatted like this, all of them were topics related to nature or human fate, and after drinking the drinks in their respective cups, they drove to Base No. 1.

Countless thick cables connect the earth and space, and their foundation lies in the highest mountain on Weigu Island, which has long been hollowed out, and the interior is where Base 1 is located.

The military, the authorities, and the team of Xingchen Technology jointly operate this mysterious underground base, which has never been opened to anyone so far, after all, the space elevator project is really too important, and it is not an exaggeration to say that it is groundbreaking.

If you've ever been on a train, you'll know how a space elevator works, the cables are made of a mixture of graphene nanotubes and carbon nanotubes, light and tough, like railroad tracks, their only task is to tie the Earth to the space station Zero, and what really carries out the transportation mission is the self-lifting space elevator and the high-power ultrasonic motor inside the elevator.

The elevator has its own power, and it climbs along the track, the fast track takes twelve hours to reach the space station zero, and the freight slow track takes seventy-two hours.

"Well, it's pretty comfortable." Luo Jia sat on the wide seat of the passenger express rail, patted it hard, and sighed: "I really wish I could sit on this thing early and go to our space station to have a look." ”

Enron expressed serious approval, they actually dreamed of going up and seeing.

However, they can't go, because space is a forbidden area for humans, and if Luo Jia and Enron run to the synchronous orbital station, it will definitely not help the robot engineering team, but cause them trouble.

After all, robots don't need oxygen, nor do they need to eat, bathe, and go to the toilet, the space station zero is currently under frantic construction, everything is based on the construction speed as the highest criterion, no water, no oxygen, no roast duck and beer, no anti-radiation coating, the environment is very harsh, only robots that are not afraid of anything, can survive there.

This is like building a house, before the building is capped, it is obviously not suitable for living, and if it is built and renovated at the same time, the efficiency is too low.

When the building is completed, the decoration and plumbing will be brought in, the renovation and plumbing will be completed, the refrigerator will be electrified, and the bedding will be placed on the bed before humans can move in, which is a necessary process.

So to what extent is Space Station Zero built today?

If we take the building as an example, within three days, the space station zero will be topped out, and all the construction will be completed.

Luo Jia and An Ran came to Weigu Island, and the day after tomorrow, there will be more people from the national team and the company who will come, all to celebrate the capping of the Zero space station.

After the capping, there are still 45 days of renovation and trial operation, and on January 1 next year, the first batch of space residents will be stationed in the space station, and from now on, it will be 48 days later, and the space station zero will open its doors to receive guests.

"There's nothing wrong here, let's go check the freight elevator." Enron said.

So Luo Jia and him, go to those large freight elevators, a total of two small high-speed elevators, in addition to the speed, whether carrying people or loading, the capacity of small elevators is very limited, the real main force in the plan, or these giants.

The freight elevator will be responsible for transporting water and food, in the future, it will transport the starship module to the space dock for assembly, and if interstellar mining is going well, the elevator will also be responsible for transporting the precious ore from space back to Earth.

Anyway, this space elevator is the bridge between human beings and the universe, and it may not be the first step for human beings to move towards the sea of stars, but it is definitely the most important step.

When Musk is still desperately releasing rockets into the sky, Xingchen Technology has completed the elimination of the rocket species, located in Jiuquan, China, the space base will mainly undertake research and education work in the future, take students to review history, miss the past or something, and no longer engage in rocket launches.

From the wine produced in Yantai, to the canned hairtail fish in Zhoushan, to the snail noodles in Guangxi, Luo Jia looked at the freight elevator that was about to take off, and really felt that the footsteps of the space age were getting closer and closer, and the base had prepared enough food and fresh water for humans to enter in 48 days.

In addition, he also deeply felt the taste of straight men, taking things like snail noodles to the space station to eat, is definitely not something that ordinary people can think of, fortunately it is not durian...

According to the consistent tradition of Xingchen Technology, in addition to food, there are also a lot of strange things, and An Ran stared at a 4.5-meter-tall, Iron Man model, which was one of the mascots of the first batch of steel straight men specially requested by the settled team.

"What do you think?" An Ran asked Luo Jia.

"I don't think much of it, when the miniaturization of nuclear fusion is completed, we will make it real." Luo Jia said quite firmly.

An Ran was slightly stunned, bowed his head slightly, and turned science fiction into reality, the good days of straight men of steel may really be coming, the ambition is so big, the earth can no longer accommodate them.

Swish~

Witnessing the freight elevator getting smaller and smaller at an alarming speed, and finally disappearing into the blue overhead, Luo Jia couldn't help but sigh, the toilet was sent up, how could it be far away from the day when the space station was delivered.

Thundered~

Just when Luo Jia was thinking about the future, he suddenly felt a little shaking under his feet, and the process lasted for a short time, only a few seconds.

"It looks like it's shaking, it can't be an earthquake, right?" An Ran muttered on the side.