[June 27, 2019]
After writing this line in the diary, Wang Qiang sniffed and looked out the window at the sky blocked by the sandstorm.
A day on Mars was only 37 minutes longer than that on Earth. According to the twenty-four-hour clock on Earth, it should be around three o 'clock in the afternoon, but it was already dusk here.
After the initial excitement, he was no longer as excited as when he first landed on Mars.
Life on Mars was boring, and communication resources were precious. Of course, it was impossible to use them to surf the Internet. Before the construction of a large communication base station, each person only had 10 minutes of phone time a day to call their relatives and friends on Earth. This was also the only way for them to obtain information on Earth.
Without the Internet, it was simply a torture for modern people.
This meant that they couldn't use their phones or Weibo, and they couldn't put on the Phantom Helmet to go to the virtual world. Half of the entertainment methods of modern people had to be marked with a big red cross.
For Wang Qiang, his daily entertainment was listening to pop music on Earth, lying in bed and reading novels brought from Earth. The pace of life seemed to have slowed down all of a sudden. Most of the other people were the same. They would find something they liked to do after work.
Fortunately, among the twenty colonists in the colony, there was a chef who was good at the four major cuisines. The colonial cabin was quite rich in supplies, and they could change their tastes every day. As a result, eating became one of the few forms of entertainment they had.
In order to boost the morale of the colonists, the captain promised them that at the end of this month, he would apply to the command center to bring more chefs in the next group of colonists. On the one hand, he had to take care of the foreigners' diet, on the other hand, he could change their tastes.
The sandstorm outside the window was getting bigger and bigger, but Wang Qiang continued to write something in his diary as if he didn't see it. This was a habit he developed after coming to Mars, mainly to kill time.
As for why he was so calm, it was because he knew very well that as long as it was not a level 13 typhoon, it couldn't blow away his anchored rover. The largest sandstorm on Mars in recorded history was only a level-12 sandstorm.
Before being sent to Mars, he was a geologist at Future Mining. Of course, he was still a geologist now. There was only one task given to him by the command center, which was to explore the geological information of Mars, search for minerals, and assess the reserves of underground water.
Although a shovelful of sand could be refined into steel, the heavy industry needed more than just steel. There were also elements such as aluminum, manganese, chromium, cobalt, and nickel, all of which were tightly covered by sand.
The colonial ship parked in the synchronous orbit had already scanned the geological information map of the area. Based on the topographic features on the map, he had identified several locations that might have deposits and groundwater enrichment areas. His job for the next month was to drive the rover to inspect these mining sites one by one and complete the final geological information mapping work.
Although he had never imagined that this would be an easy job, the conditions were still beyond his expectations.
The entire Mars was a desert, and there was no shelter at all. It was the fifth time he encountered a sandstorm today. If it wasn't for the space colonization ship monitoring the weather data 24/7, he wouldn't have dared to get off.
The weather on Mars was unpredictable. Sandstorms came and went quickly.
When the wind index returned to a safe value, the dusky sky finally reappeared in his sight.
Because of the thin atmosphere, there were more dust particles and they were larger. Because of the Mill scattering effect, the dust scattered red light with the same wavelength as the size of its own particles. The sky in the non-solar direction was red, while the light around the sun was blue.
Such a magnificent scenery could only be seen on Mars.
However, no matter how beautiful the scenery was, it would become a normal scenery after a while. Wang Qiang began to miss Coro Island. The beautiful island, the sea breeze mixed with the smell of seafood, and the blue sky.
Wang Qiang shook his head, put away the diary, and at the same time, put away the memories of Earth.
He opened the door, put on his spacesuit, and jumped onto the sand with the equipment box. In order to prevent a sudden sandstorm attack, he opened the anchor device of the rover chassis before getting off and connected a safety rope to his back.
This was not a joke. Although he hadn't seen it with his own eyes, he heard before he came that the sandstorm here could reach the level of a level 12 typhoon on Earth. It was too easy to blow away his small arms and legs.
"Lake bed sedimentary facies? This is almost weathered. There should be water underneath, but I don't know how much … "
Wang Qiang put away the holographic image and carried the equipment that was about the size of a suitcase. He found a relatively flat position on the ground and then fixed the equipment on it.
The entire set of equipment was not high tech, but it was quite practical. There was a firing pin at the bottom of the equipment that could simulate seismic waves by hitting the surface at high speed. Based on the different propagation speeds of the waves in different media, it could determine the lithology of different depths of the stratum. At the same time, it could determine whether there was groundwater under the area and how deep it was.
Wang Qiang took the tablet from the chest of the spacesuit, connected the data cable to the device, and then exported the waveform diagram.
"Import complete, let me see …"
Wang Qiang looked down the waveform diagram and had a general understanding of the geological situation here. However, when he saw a position about two kilometers underground, he suddenly froze and frowned.
"… Did I get it wrong?"
Two kilometers underground, the three red, blue, and green waveforms had a large distortion and even intertwined. In his more than ten years of work experience, this was the first time he saw this situation.
After backing up the waveform diagram, Wang Qiang restarted the equipment, waited for three minutes, and measured another set of data.
However, the result this time was still the same.
Future Heavy Industries' equipment was known for its durability, and it was impossible for it to break down after only a few days of use. However, after eliminating the possibility of equipment failure, there was only one remaining situation, and that was the geological information of the target area was extremely complex.
In the more than one hundred meters of the stratum, iron, aluminum, titanium … and something unknown appeared at the same time.
Even an idiot would know that it was impossible for it to be formed naturally.
But if it was not formed naturally, what could it be?
A thought suddenly emerged in Wang Qiang's mind, and his heart began to beat faster.
"… Fu * k, did I find a treasure?"
Wang Qiang took a deep breath, restrained the excitement in his heart, and ignored the third set of data. He put the tablet back in his chest, pressed on the helmet of the spacesuit, and connected to the command center of the colony chamber through the radio on the rover.
"This is Explorer 01, calling the command center. I have some problems here … It's not a security situation. I found something interesting here. "
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