Xiaomi Heavy Industry, its first entrepreneurial venture!

Chapter 352 Patience! (First Update!)

At an altitude of 754.45 kilometers above the ground, NASA's H-earth satellite floats silently, constantly guided by signals from the ground, adjusting its position.

This is an Earth science satellite. America launched this satellite primarily to monitor changes in the polar ice caps and the Earth's atmosphere.

It is also a satellite equipped with an autonomous damage system.

Guided by ground signals, H-earth finally adjusted its position, aligning its front side—the side with the observation lens—with the opposite direction of Earth's rotation.

As soon as the camera was pointed, a point of light appeared in the distance, emerging from the darkness.

That's a new satellite.

The satellite's surface, its front side, is painted with the Saudi Arabian flag, making it appear to be a Saudi Arabian satellite.

At that moment, a signal arrived from the ground, and H-earth moved forward a little more, appearing to be even closer to the Saudi Arabian satellite.

Just then, the satellite in front suddenly started spewing gas from its lower right side, and the frequency of the gas was extremely high.

It appears to be adjusting the track.

Just then, H-earth received another signal from the ground, a signal that the detonation was imminent.

Upon receiving this signal, the intelligent system inside H-earth is activated. Within 0.001 seconds, the signal is transmitted through the satellite host to the satellite's automatic damage system.

The automatic destruction system was activated, detonating the 5 kg TNT carried inside the satellite within 0.1 seconds.

Under the control of the automatic damage control system, the impact generated by the explosion of 5 kg TNT was evenly distributed to every corner of the satellite, causing it to explode into countless fragments in the predetermined direction.

The impact of the explosion sent fragments flying in one direction like shotgun pellets.

And this direction is precisely the direction in which the satellite ahead is moving.

…………

Yanjing West Suburbs Aerospace Control Center.

Wei Jianguo, wearing a coat, rushed into the control room like the wind. As soon as he entered the door, he saw radar data transmitted from multiple observation stations on the large screen in front of him.

On the screen, the green dot representing the Xiaomi 1 satellite collided head-on with a bunch of observed satellite debris.

Seeing this, his heart sank.

The control center controls the satellite in real time, with a delay of only a few milliseconds, which is almost imperceptible to humans.

However, that was hundreds of kilometers in the air.

Even at the fastest speed, it takes two to three seconds for a person to see the radar screen and for instructions to be issued from the control console.

In just two or three seconds, the satellite in space had already traveled more than ten kilometers away, and the debris that was more than ten kilometers away just seconds before had probably already collided with it when the command was issued.

And there were two such scenes!

Besides these two scenes, on another screen, there are two satellites accelerating towards a single satellite from two different angles.

Soon, in the images generated by the radar data, the two satellites collided one after the other, and then a large number of fragments were scattered in all directions like a rainstorm.

Looking at the image displayed on the screen, Wei Jianguo felt his legs go weak. He wanted to take a step, but he couldn't move his feet at all.

He opened his mouth to shout, but the words that came out of his mouth changed their meaning and turned into a single, hoarse roar.

It was as if someone had possessed him, taken away his body.

After struggling for a few seconds, he finally shouted out:
"Immediately initiate self-checks on the attacked satellites to assess the damage!"

"At the same time, notify the General Armament Department that our satellite has been attacked and ask them to make a decision!"

After shouting those two sentences, Wei Jianguo felt his body go limp. As soon as he took a step, he fell to the ground uncontrollably. In the instant he fell, he quickly braced himself with his hands to prevent his face from making a friendly collision with the ground.

He knelt on the ground, paused for two seconds, and was about to get up when a pair of hands reached into each of his left and right arms. These two hands then powerfully lifted her up from the ground and helped her to the command platform next to him.

Just as I sat down, the phone next to me rang. The communications officer answered it, then turned and called out:

"Director, it's a call from Director Jia of the Chang'an Observation Center!"

"Turn on the speakerphone!"

With the speakerphone on, Jia Ming'an's anxious voice came through the phone:

What exactly is the situation with Wei Jianguo?

"I don't know either! I just got to the control room, and as soon as I arrived, I saw your routine observation data. Two of America's satellites exploded on their own, and then two other satellites collided and also exploded into a bunch of debris. The target is our three satellites. Our people have already started the satellite detection program, and in about 10 minutes, we should be able to find out if our satellites have been damaged."

Upon hearing Wei Jianguo's words, Jia Ming'an on the other end of the phone visibly breathed a sigh of relief, and then fell silent.

Two or three minutes later, his voice came again:
"We've observed that the attitude of the Xiaomi 1 satellite is normal, with no obvious changes. Have you received your results yet?"

"It'll be a while!" Wei Jianguo sat in his chair, staring menacingly at the screen in front of him, and answered in a low voice.

A few more minutes passed, and the person in charge of the satellite control self-check turned around:

"The automatic detection program has been successfully run. The program is able to detect all the hardware, including the solar panels, our satellite..."

"It seems...it seems there was no impact from debris."

"All three satellites are the same; they did not suffer any damage."

The hesitant words, trembling slightly, echoed in the air traffic control room.

Everyone who heard this was stunned.

After a satellite breaks apart, the resulting fragments vary in size. Moreover, because they move at high speeds, even if the fragments are stationary, the satellite will still be pulverized upon impact.

If it is indeed hit, the program will definitely detect the hardware damage.

If no hardware damage has been detected, then there are only two possibilities.

The first scenario is that the program malfunctioned, and the person didn't even realize their body was gone.

The second possibility is that you're lucky and the satellite doesn't get a scratch at all.

Considering that the Xiaomi Satellite 1 was already controlled to change its orbit before the collision, the other party would have to change its orbit hastily if it wanted to collide with it.

In a rush, it is indeed possible for a satellite to avoid all the debris.

Upon realizing this possibility, Wei Jianguo breathed a sigh of relief and began to think of a solution.

Soon, an idea took shape in his mind.

Satellites are considered electronic devices.

All electronic devices can be fixed by rebooting; once rebooted, everything will be fine again.

If the restart fails, it means the device is broken.

Thinking of this, he immediately issued the order:
"Completely shut down the satellite, then restart it after 30 seconds. If it restarts successfully, then the debris from earlier has no effect."

"If the computer cannot be started after being shut down, it means that there is a problem with the program. After the collision, it is unable to effectively detect its own hardware."

Upon receiving the instruction, the personnel responsible for controlling the satellite quickly shut it down. As soon as the 30-second countdown ended, the relevant signals were sent from the control center and transmitted to the satellite via the receiving antenna. Although it was completely shut down, the satellite's basic signal receiving equipment continued to operate.

Upon receiving the power-on signal from the ground, the satellite lens flashed green twice and began to start up.

After a short wait, the control center received a signal from the satellite.

The group of people dared not be careless and quickly took control of the satellite, going through the procedures they had gone through before again.

Once the process was completed, all the data led to one conclusion—the satellite was not hit by debris.

Upon receiving this answer, a sliver of color finally returned to Wei Jianguo's deathly pale face, but what followed was anger.

This was a premeditated attack.

If it weren't for the quick response of the staff on night duty, who changed the satellite's orbit immediately upon discovering the anomaly, it would have been a disaster.

The satellite navigation system that has been painstakingly established will suffer major problems because of this attack.

He took a deep breath and turned to look at the communications officer beside him:
"Get me to the final assembly line!"

The communications officer received instructions and turned around to make a call, but the phone rang first; it was a call from the Chang'an Observation Center.

He answered the call and put it on speakerphone.

The next moment, Jia Ming'an's voice came through the phone:

"Did you manually shut down those three satellites just now?"

"My signal reception is normal, how about yours?"

"Everything is normal!" Wei Jianguo's voice became exceptionally serious. He walked straight over, stood next to the microphone, and continued to speak loudly:

"We were lucky. Several of our satellites changed their orbits in advance, catching the enemy off guard. Their satellites chased after them and detonated, but the angle was slightly off, and the debris from the explosion did not affect our satellites."

"I was just about to report to the General Armament Department when you called."

After the explanation was finished, a heavy sigh was clearly and distinctly transmitted to the ears of everyone in the control room through the handset.

Then, Jia Ming'an's voice came: "Then go and report it. I'll monitor the debris here and remind our international counterparts as well."

After hanging up the phone and calming himself down a bit, Wei Jianguo quickly called Guo Song.

It was already past midnight when the call was made, and Guo Song's tired voice came through the phone:
"How's it going?"

"Luckily, the satellite avoided the debris attack!"

"That's good, that's good, that's good." Guo Song said "good" three times in a relieved tone, his voice becoming much lighter. But soon, his voice became serious again:
"Could we find something on them and get them into trouble?"

"It's impossible!" Wei Jianguo replied regretfully, and fearing the other person wouldn't understand, he quickly explained:
"It was NASA that took action, not America's military."

“These bastards issued a notice in advance, and clearly stated in the notice that the satellite was out of control and they were adjusting the orbit to try to push the satellite away.”

"With this announcement in place, they can push any claim we make onto the satellite being out of control."

“Even if we ask them to release the data, they can refuse to do so on the grounds of data confidentiality.”

"Furthermore, the international public opinion arena is dominated by them. I estimate that their public opinion campaign has already begun, and they are just waiting for us to step in and question them."

"In the end, we will not only gain nothing, but also get ourselves into a lot of trouble."

"If we want to counter them, we have to start from other places."

As they were talking, Wei Jianguo heard the sound of a fist slamming on the table coming from Guo Song's direction, followed by Guo Song swearing.

"Damn it, do you think nobody in this world can handle them?"

Upon hearing this, Wei Jianguo chuckled awkwardly on the other end of the phone, then spoke very seriously into the receiver:
"Boss, you're right."

"They know that no one in this world can control them, which is why they are so arrogant."

The words were so realistic that they left Guo Song, on the other end of the phone, completely silent.

After a long silence, Guo Song's voice came again: "I just contacted the leaders, and they said..."

"They said this matter first..."

"Let's give it a cold treatment first..."

"If it gets exposed by others later, then let's go along with America's story and let them gloat for now."

"Let's keep this in mind for now, and when we have the strength in the future, we'll knock down all their satellites."

"I'm hanging up now, I need to catch my breath!"

First, I heard the sound of someone hanging up, followed by a dial tone.

Wei Jianguo put the microphone back in its place, his hand pressing against it. The others in the finance control room said:

"You guys keep an eye on things. I'm going out for a smoke and to catch my breath."

After hastily arranging his work, Wei Jianguo grabbed a pack of cigarettes from a colleague, quickly left the control room, found a quiet, dark corner, lit the cigarette, and put it in his mouth.

He smoked it intermittently.

In the darkness, the cigarette glowed and faded with his breath, occasionally illuminating his gloomy face.

He had just finished smoking a cigarette when footsteps approached, stopping right in front of him. A hand was held out in front of him.
"Chief, have a cigarette."

I had just offered a cigarette when another hand reached out in front of me:

"Director..."

On the other side, in the general assembly department, Guo Song had just smoked two cigarettes when a hand was stretched out in front of him: "Give me one of your cigarettes. I was in a hurry to come out and didn't bring any."

Guo Song looked up and saw Zhu Jingyao, with Yi Guoping behind him.

Both men were covered in sweat, their clothes wrinkled, clearly having arrived in a hurry. He casually handed them two cigarettes and tossed them two tissues.

"Go ahead and smoke it. This is the last box we'll have today."

"What is the attitude of the leadership and the General Staff?"

Zhu Jingyao lit a cigarette, held it between his fingers, and took a deep drag: "The leaders and the General Staff mean one word: endure."

"Wait for our aircraft carrier to be launched, wait for our new aircraft to take to the skies, wait for our missiles to be upgraded."

"Wait until the right time, until we're capable of going toe-to-toe with them, then we'll discuss with them what they mean by 'accident'!"

Upon hearing this, Guo Song took a deep drag on his cigarette, smoking half of it before throwing the butt on the ground and stomping on it.
"In that case, contact the observation centers in various locations and tell them to forget about this."

"Let's pretend nothing happened tonight."

"I'll call Lin Yi personally at Xiaomi Heavy Industry tomorrow morning when I'm at work."

(End of this chapter)