Europa was known as Europa in astronomy.
It had nothing to do with the continent of Europa, but it was named after a beautiful Phoenician princess in ancient Greek mythology. Although the two were spelled the same, the meaning was very different.
And it turned out that floating in the deep and dark universe, this planet suspected to be pregnant with life was indeed as beautiful as a foreign princess.
On the vast glacier, layers of fine ice debris flew, and from time to time, icicles ejected from the cracks, scattering ice flowers in the air like ginkgo trees. The thin atmosphere contained a trace of oxygen, although compared to the oxygen content in the Earth's atmosphere, this amount was not worth mentioning at all.
Standing on the white glacier, a small half of the sky was occupied by the huge Jupiter, which was embedded in the horizon from the sky, giving people the illusion that if they kept walking toward Jupiter, they would be able to reach Jupiter.
Due to the plagiarism lock, the huge planet was always hovering there. Most of the light came from the sunlight reflected from Jupiter. As for the sun itself, it was just a soft bright spot from here. Therefore, the side facing Jupiter was always bright, and the glaciers were illuminated snow-white, while the side facing away from Jupiter was endless darkness.
The temperature at the equator was about -160 degrees, and the temperature at the poles was below -200 degrees. The ice layer on the surface of Europa was several kilometers thick, and under the several kilometers thick ice layer was an ocean deeper than Earth.
But in general, the climate and environment here were still much better than on Himalia.
Located between the two glaciers was a black colony.
As for why black was chosen, which was incompatible with the background, it was naturally to absorb more light and heat from Jupiter from the limited illumination.
At this moment, the colony's hatch slowly opened, and a space vehicle drove out of the garage and headed for the drilling rig not far away.
"This is number Z1214. We have arrived at the destination. The drilling rig is operating well, and the battery is being replaced."
"Roger … Please report the situation at any time."
"Understood."
An engineer wearing a heavy spacesuit jumped out of the space vehicle, opened the trunk of the space vehicle, took out a battery about the size of a laptop, and walked in the direction of the drilling rig.
His name was Tan Ming, and he came from China. He was one of the first immigrants from the Earth Defense Alliance's Europa Cooperation Development Plan. Before setting foot on this land, he had only received one month of adaptation training on the moon. As for the thing in his hand, it was a nuclear battery with helium-3 and tritium inside, wrapped in a thick lead insulator.
The gravitational environment on Europa was slightly better than that of Himalia, about one-seventh of Earth's gravity, slightly lower than that of the Moon. Anyone who had received spacewalk training in Guanghan City could easily adapt to this level of gravity.
Tan Ming jumped onto the bracket, took out a wrench from behind him, twisted the bolt fixed on the battery interface, pulled out a data cable, connected it to the wrist-mounted computer on his arm, and entered the password to unlock it.
With a light sound of air leaking, the movable door that held the battery in place sprang open.
He skillfully removed the battery from the drilling platform, then stuffed the battery in his left hand into the groove, then closed the battery compartment door and tightened the bolts.
"This is number Z1214. The battery has been replaced. The power supply to the drilling rig is normal."
"Check the drill."
"Checking …" Tan Ming typed a few buttons on the wrist-mounted computer and watched the progress bar fill up. He then breathed a sigh of relief and continued, "The drill is in good condition. Do you want me to open it?"
"Open it."
The engineer skillfully jumped off the drilling platform's bracket and floated steadily to the ground.
With a muffled rumble coming from the soles of his feet, the drilling platform behind him began to operate again.
In the outpost not far away, all the scientific researchers, no matter which country they came from, surrounded the command room of the outpost at this moment, quietly watching the red line that was constantly moving downward on the screen. From the moment the drilling platform was erected, they had been waiting for this moment. In the blink of an eye, a month had passed.
According to the analysis of the Coro University Institute of Alien Biology, with a suitable seabed temperature, rich oxygen resources, and undersea volcanoes, life was likely to exist under Europa's ice sheet. All drills and detectors were sterilized to avoid contamination of Europa's ocean by Earth colonies or viruses.
The red dot that marked the drill continued to move downward, and the return shock wave began to become stronger and stronger, getting closer and closer to the interface between ice and water.
If there were no accidents, today would be the moment the ice broke!
At this moment, on another holographic screen, the shock wave suddenly shook violently, and the alarm signal light sounded. The entire command room was like boiling water, and all the staff immediately became busy.
"The ice is cracking, and a large amount of gas is detected!"
"Stop drilling, detonate the perforation device!"
"Roger!"
After receiving the order from the commander, the staff sitting in front of the podium immediately held the red handle and pushed it to the bottom.
On Europa, heat was more important than water. The water resources here were extremely abundant, even more than on Earth. The water on Earth was basically on the surface, but all the water on Europa was stored in its stomach.
NASA did a horizontal comparison in this area a long time ago. Through data modeling, the water resources of Earth and Europa were stacked into a sphere, and the final conclusion was the same.
The tidal force caused Europa itself to be in a state of repeated stretching and contraction. The energy generated by this movement heated the seawater under the ice layer, and together with submarine volcanic activity, provided heat for the life activities of seabed creatures.
However, it was precisely because of this stretching and contraction movement caused by the tidal force that Europa's ice sheet was very prone to compression similar to Earth's plate movement, resulting in cracks, uplifted glaciers, and fractured ice valleys. On Europa, water columns hundreds of kilometers high could often be seen ejecting from the cracks, and the spectacular scene of water instantly solidifying into ice crystals at ultra-low temperatures was because of this.
Almost at the moment when the handle was pushed down, above the drill bit that was several kilometers deep into the ice sheet, a flash of fire suddenly flashed for a moment. The anchor hook that exploded from the electromagnetic ejection fiercely plunged into the ice sheet that was squeezing the drill pipe, fixing the drill bit in the ice.
At the same time, a violent tremor broke out under the drill bit, and cracks began to spread upward from the back of the ice sheet. The ice sheet that was almost penetrated by the drill bit began to break in large areas from the back. The moment the cracks touched the drill bit, the entire ice sheet was like a punctured balloon. The seawater mixed with high-pressure bubbles crashed into the drill bit in an instant —
"Damn it! The drill pipe is broken! "
"Z1214, evacuate the area immediately. I repeat, evacuate immediately!"
Tan Ming felt the tremor coming from the soles of his feet. He took a few steps back in horror. When he heard the voice in his ear, he immediately climbed in the direction of the space car without saying a word. He started the engine and shouted.
"Fu * k! What did you just do?! "
"We didn't do anything … The situation below may be more complicated than we thought … Anyway, you should get out of here quickly …"
He didn't pay attention to what the command center said behind him. After he got into the driver's seat, he started the space car as fast as he could. He stepped on the gas pedal to the limit. Just as he was about five to six hundred meters away, he heard a loud noise coming from under the seat. It was so loud that it almost lifted him up from his seat.
"Fu * k!"
Tan Ming subconsciously looked back and saw that the drilling platform, which was dozens of meters tall, was blasted into the sky by an icicle that was like a volcanic eruption. The water column that spiraled upwards spread out circles of pure white ice shards in the air, as if a tornado had grown out of the ground, dancing in the air in a charming manner.
His foot that was stepping on the accelerator involuntarily let go, and the space car that had already driven out of the danger zone slowly came to a stop. Hailstones the size of mung beans gently hit the glass window, and his line of sight was fixed there.
Tan Ming swore.
This was definitely the most spectacular scene he had ever seen in his life …
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