Chapter 1274 Space Fishing!

The entire press conference lasted nearly two hours, but there were still many media outlets whose turn had not yet come rushed to ask questions.

Director Sun Yanlai, who was mainly responsible for answering the questions, was obviously in high spirits, with the corners of his mouth almost stretching to his ears.

But after the press officer next to him pointed to his watch for the third time to remind him to pay attention to the time, he had to temporarily put away the urge to continue showing off:

"Cough-cough-"

It was not until this moment that he felt that his throat was about to smoke.

So he quickly drank some water, cleared his throat, and then raised his hands and pressed down:

“Although I would like to continue communicating with you, according to our plan, the satellite’s equipment self-inspection process is nearing completion, and we will soon enter the formal space debris capture process... All journalists can exit in an orderly manner, or choose to stay here and witness this historic moment with us..."

Obviously, it is impossible for any one person to choose to leave.

At this moment, tens of millions, even hundreds of millions, of eyes around the world are staring at the tiny bit of light in the center of the screen through a camera with only 480P pixels.

The satellite had now reached an area where it could be directly exposed to sunlight. Even without getting close to the screen, Griffin could already see some details of the solar panel.

For example, just as many people had worried before, after a violent collision, the solar panel did not completely maintain its original shape, but bent in the middle to form a V-shaped structure.

Combined with the irregular rolling at a certain angular velocity, it would be a huge hassle if a rigid robotic arm were used to grab it.

Even he couldn't help but sigh at the ingenuity of the other party's flying net capture plan -

Perhaps in time, NASA will remember this technical route that was abandoned ten years ago.

But no matter what, we are always one step slower than others.

Griffin sighed softly and prepared to lie back down on the bed.

After all, he was a patient who had just regained consciousness. The brainstorming session just now had consumed a lot of his energy, and he felt a little weak now.

However, the phone on the table next to him suddenly rang.

Griffin, who had already lifted the quilt, had no choice but to turn around and pick it up.

Assistant Meyer's voice came from the other side:

"Director, everything you asked me to do has been done... The relevant information has been made public on the website. In addition, the tracking and control station has confirmed that China's latest satellite is in nearly the same orbit as space debris No. 40396. Twenty minutes ago, the distance between the two was about 20 kilometers. Currently, the two are in a tracking and control blind spot, but new results will be transmitted back soon."

"1.8 kilometers..."

He turned and glanced at the TV screen.

Judging from the perspective, it is not much different from the situation in the picture, which means that the camera lens is not in the zoomed state at this moment.

Of course, at this point, these numbers are no longer important.

What is important is the calming and handling of the subsequent impacts.

"Ok, I know……"

He was about to put down the phone when he suddenly realized something else:

"Wait...left our monitoring area 20 minutes ago?"

The coverage of the U.S. space tracking and control network is quite high, and there are not many large blind spots that would experience such long interruptions.

"So the space junk... of course, the Chinese satellite, where is it currently?"

There was a humming sound coming from the other end of the receiver, as if someone was whispering a question to the person next to them.

After a few seconds, Meyer responded:

"Over the North Pacific Ocean, to be specific... there will be a close encounter with the International Space Station in about 10 minutes, but the orbital distance is still about 1.8km, so there is absolutely no risk of collision..."

"..."

Griffin couldn't hear clearly what was said afterwards.

Now there was only one voice echoing in his mind:

"You have already calculated this?"

……

At the same time, the TV broadcast picture, which had been almost fixed, finally underwent its first obvious change.

A circle of antenna-like objects surrounding the camera suddenly began to rotate at a low speed, and then a bright light suddenly flashed on the left side of the camera.

For the first time, the voice of the space control center was heard in the background:

"The device began to spin."

Of course, the command orders were not translated, and since they were not very clear in the first place, most people, including Griffin, did not understand what was happening for a while.

Fortunately, the press conference, which had been silent for several minutes, began to speak again.

"Because of the camera's viewing angle, we can't actually see most of the satellite."

Sun Yanlai's desire to express himself was obviously not fully satisfied, so he simply acted as a commentator in the capacity of director of the space agency:

"Now the functional payload on the satellite's head, that is, the device used to capture space junk, will begin to rotate slowly in a while. On the one hand, it is for lubrication, and on the other hand, it is used to maintain stability through spin. Since there is almost no resistance in space, the momentum applied to the payload will react on the satellite itself. The bright light on the left side of the screen just now is the anti-rotation engine working briefly to maintain the overall stability of the satellite..."

As soon as the words fell, the image captured by the camera began to zoom in and refocus.

About half a minute later, the piece of space junk No. 40396 finally appeared in front of the world in its clear appearance for the first time.

The press conference was suddenly filled with the sound of clicking.

Obviously, everyone wanted to record this rare moment.

But Sun Yanlai said very appropriately:

"Everyone, rest assured, the video footage of this mission, including videos and pictures, will be released on our official website later..."

There were media reporters present, so such news naturally drew applause.

However, it didn't last long.

Because at this time, along with the "orbital upgrade" command, the video screen began to shake slightly but rhythmically.

In fact, for professionals, this situation is very normal.

But in the eyes of the audience, this does not seem to be a good phenomenon.

Some people even couldn't hold their breath and cried out in surprise.

"This is the satellite's main power system at work..."

Sun Yanlai quickly explained:

"Before the capture process officially began, the orbital altitude of our Fishing Boat No. 35 was meters lower than the target. Considering that the capture mechanism will cause the satellite to decelerate and lower its orbit after being ejected, we now need to slightly increase the orbital altitude and further improve the alignment accuracy to ensure success in one try."

In space, a difference of tens of meters in height is impossible to distinguish with the naked eye without a clear reference object.

Therefore, everyone could only see the picture shaking for about a minute, and then it returned to calm.

"Countdown, 3 minutes to get ready."

Another command was given.

Almost at the same time, some sharp-eyed people noticed that a blurry white shadow suddenly appeared in the lower right corner of the camera screen and seemed to be slowly approaching.

"That is……"

Soon someone guessed the correct result.

But for a moment I couldn't believe it.

Finally, it was Sun Yan who revealed the answer:

"That's the International Space Station. There's a not-so-large intersection angle between its orbit and the satellite's, so it's approaching us very quickly... It's worth noting that just three days ago, the difference in their orbital altitudes was about 2.4 kilometers, but now it's only about 1.8 kilometers. If we're a few days slower in our reaction, the consequences could be disastrous..."

There was a burst of exclamations at the scene in unison.

Logically speaking, this is not the question-and-answer session.

But if you can't help it, you'll be in trouble:

"Mr. Director, does this mean that the entire capture process can be visually observed by astronauts on the International Space Station?"

"Well... maybe we can, we don't have any special design for this"

Sun Yanlai almost couldn't hold back her smile, but luckily she managed to control it in the end:

"But judging by the current situation, this is indeed possible... If the astronauts on the space station happen to be looking outside... You know, they are usually very busy with their work, and it is impossible for them to always be enjoying the scenery..."

No one with half a brain would believe this.

However, those who could sit down and attend the reception were all smart people, and no one would break this window paper.

"Countdown, 1 minutes to get ready."

Although separated by a screen, the audience seemed to be able to feel that something on the satellite seemed to come alive from the original silence.

The space station in the lower right corner is getting closer and closer, and people with good eyesight can even see the iconic truss structure.

"30 seconds..."

"10, 9, 8..."

At this point, even people who don’t understand Chinese know that this is the final countdown.

What's more, a shrinking Arabic numeral immediately appeared in the upper right corner of the screen.

In front of countless televisions, in squares filled with space enthusiasts, and in auditoriums of schools and units...

There are countless people shouting along in different languages.

"3...2...1..."

The vacuum of outer space cannot transmit sound, but the attention and expectations from millions of people seem to be enough to break through the sky.

"Net launch!"

Everyone's heartbeat seemed to stop at this moment.

After a delay of about half a second, the picture shook and a gray shadow was projected from directly above the camera.

Behind it, there is a thin line that is not easily noticeable in the image.

Soon, the carefully designed folding mechanism began to open layer by layer under the traction of several counterweights, forming a large net with loose mesh but almost covering the sky. Like the inescapable Five Finger Mountain, it flew towards the solar panels 1.8 kilometers ahead.

The next few minutes seemed like an eternity.

Finally, just when some people were so nervous that they could hardly breathe.

The camera screen flashed, and a striking solid white dot appeared in the lower right corner.

"The net is in contact with the target!"

This command was quickly translated into English in the form of text and appeared in the lower center of the TV screen.

But it's not time to celebrate yet.

After the net came into contact with the space debris, several counterweights around the rope net pulled the edge to continue flying forward, but because the center part was blocked, it naturally changed from level flight to inward retraction.

Just like a real fishing net.

At the same time, the tightening module inside the counterweight starts working, gradually "binding" the rope made of composite material to the target surface.

After a few long minutes, the huge net that was originally baring its fangs and claws disappeared from the screen.

Instead, there is a dense mesh of holes on the surface of the V-shaped space debris.

"The Beijing Aerospace Control Center has confirmed that the network has been successfully closed!"

The long-suppressed emotions finally erupted across almost the entire surface of the earth after this final confirmation command sounded.

At the media reception held by the China Space Administration, there was a burst of applause as loud as thunder!