Chapter 42 Chapter Fourteen: Battle in the Deep Sea

The cold air mass coming up from the northern continent controlled the waters of the South China Sea.In the foggy season along the coast of Guangdong, Xisha is exceptionally clear. This is what local fishermen say "the fog does not reach Xisha".The Xisha Meteorological Station, referring to the strength of the satellite cloud, issued a weather forecast to the Tianyuan No. 4 Engineering Headquarters on December 4, saying that within the next 72 hours, there will be continuous fine weather with no wind in the Xisha area. The participants of Tianyuan Fourth Project immediately became busy.Ke Hua personally directed the salvage operation in the cockpit of the "Hercules".Scientists sat in front of the big screen, excitedly waiting for the coming moment.

"Hercules" recalibrated its position with the dynamic positioning device, the underwater TV system started to work, and the golden spherical shell of the spaceship appeared on the big fluorescent screen again.A group of deep-sea fish with big mouths swam leisurely beside the spaceship. The giant hand under the high-strength steel cable slowly descended, and its huge steel claws just covered the spaceship without deviation.Captain Wu pulled a red joystick, and the two sets of steel claws on the giant hand gradually closed.Those big mouth fish ran away in a hurry. Suddenly, the six searchlights installed on the beam of the giant hand went out at the same time, and the big fluorescent screen was pitch black.

Captain Wu immediately checked the power control panel and pressed a few buttons, but the big fluorescent screen was still pitch black, and occasionally a few fish that could glow by themselves flashed across the screen like phantoms with light red beams. Engineer Qu went to the console and checked it with instruments.He said sadly: "The searchlight cable is disconnected." "Where did it break?" Captain Wu asked. "About 210 meters from the water surface." Ke Hua asked everyone for their opinions. "Since the giant hand has grabbed the spaceship, let's hang it up slowly." Yue Jing said with a bright smile, as if nothing had happened.

"This won't work!" Lao Qu, the salvage engineer, said seriously, "We originally said that the spacecraft was not attached to the seabed, but that was just an estimate. During the actual lifting process, many unexpected situations may occur. If we lift it blindly now, it is very likely that Further damage to the ship." Xu Zhenyu and Liang Weizhou also resolutely opposed it when they heard that the spacecraft might be further damaged. Fang Yutian came up with another idea: "Since the spaceship cannot be salvaged, let go of the giant hand, and then drive the empty car to collect the steel cable for inspection and repair."

Liang Weizhou listened very vigilantly, for fear that others would come up with any ideas that would damage the spacecraft.Before Fang Yutian finished speaking, he stood up and objected: "Think about it, this steel cable is more than 900 meters long. As long as the top shakes one meter, the giant hand below can smash the spaceship. Although this ship can automatically position itself, it only ensures that the amount of movement is not enough. More than ten meters!" "Are there any spare searchlights on the ship?" Ren Sihong asked. "There are searchlights, but we have no way to hoist these searchlights to the bottom of the sea other than pulling up the steel cables," Captain Wu said.

Inspired by Zhang Ji, his bearded face looked optimistic.He said: "I can remove the laser underwater TV equipment on the 'Zheng He' and reinstall it here. It can clearly illuminate the bottom of the sea when it is on the water surface." "How long do you need?" Engineer Qu asked. "Two days are enough." "Two days? Our current state of being unable to go up and down must be resolved before the tide rises. Otherwise, once the tide arrives, the ship may move as much as ten meters, and the steel cable will drag the spaceship to pieces!" The song engineer looked a little uneasy.

"When is the tide today?" Ke Hua asked with concern. Captain Wu opened the logbook and said: "The high tide time yesterday was 15:00. Today's high tide time should be delayed by 48 minutes, which is 15:48." Ke Hua looked at his watch, it was already 10:20! "If there is no better way, then the only solution is to go into the sea with a deep submersible." Captain Wu said. Ke Hua agreed with this method and asked him to make preparations immediately, especially in terms of safety rescue. Many people wanted to participate in the deep dive, and it was finally determined that Engineer Qu, Xu Zhenyu and Yang Jixian would go into the sea with the deep submersible.

Yang Fan, the doctor on board the "Zheng He", was picked up by the boat, and she assisted the diving doctor on the "Hercules" to do some preparations.The diving doctor told her that if the divers do not work outside the deep submersible, then the normal air pressure in the deep submersible will always be maintained, and they will not need to do anything after landing.If the diver must leave the deep submersible underwater, when the diver finishes his work, he needs to increase the air pressure in the deep submersible to the same pressure as the seawater so that he can return to the deep submersible.When they returned to the surface, because they had all sucked high-pressure air, a large amount of nitrogen was dissolved in their bodies, so they had to be sent to the decompression chamber to gradually depressurize, so that the nitrogen in their bodies could be released gradually.If you fail to get decompression sickness, there is still a certain danger.

After hearing what the diving doctor said, Yang Fan looked uncomfortable.After being busy for a while, she went to the rear deck to find Zhenyu and her younger brother. The spherical deep submersible is parked on the support, the tarpaulin on it has been removed, and several crew members are conducting final inspections.When Yang Fan saw Xu Zhenyu beside the deep submersible, she said with concern: "I heard that deep diving is still dangerous. You must pay attention to safety after you go down. Especially you, you have never dived before, so be more careful, don't worry me."

"I just need to be more careful." Xu Zhenyu looked at her, his eyes seemed to say, "Just don't worry." Just as I was talking, Ji Xian came.Yang Fan called him over and took care of him: "Don't think that you are a diver. You have worked for a long time and your skills are good. If you go down, you don't care. Both of you have to be careful!" "It's nothing, it won't be dangerous." Yang Jixian smiled indifferently, "Sister, don't worry!" The submersible has been checked.Engineer Qu, Xu Zhenyu and Yang Jixian walked under the support and drilled in from a circular entrance under the deep submersible.After Yang Jixian went in, he closed the sealing cover at the entrance, and then climbed into the cockpit through a long and narrow passageway as high as a person.

Yang Fan was outside the deep submersible, and saw Xu Zhenyu and Yang Jixian sitting there happily from the observation window.She waved to them nervously.Yue Jing saw that her face was not looking well, and asked with concern: "Sister Yang, what's the matter with you, are you feeling unwell?" "No." She smiled unnaturally. Ke Hua, Captain Wu, Huang Jingzhi and others also waved to them.The deep submersible was hoisted into the water and submerged in a blink of an eye. Engineer Qu manipulated the submersible to descend slowly.Looking out from the observation window, the sea water below is azure blue, and the sea water above is light green, with white light shining among the light green.Frightened, a group of flying fish rushed straight up and disappeared out of the water in an instant. The light on the sea gradually dimmed.Several dolphins jumped and swam past them. Engineer Qu took a look at the depth gauge, and now he has dived 20 meters.He turned on the headlights, and two beams of white light shot forward from the top of the deep submersible, and within more than 20 meters, they were clearly illuminated.Seeing the sudden light, several big sharks swept their well-developed tail fins and disappeared without a trace. A set of high-strength steel cables hanging on the "Hercules" is just ahead, and several cables attached to it can be clearly seen from the observation window.The deep submersible always keeps a certain distance from it.A school of tuna scuttled beneath it. The sea water turned dark green, and there was nothing to see where there was no light.At this time the depth gauge was pointing at 50 meters.A big jellyfish floated up like an upside-down peony flower.Xu Zhenyu didn't bother to appreciate it, and focused on the searchlight cable. The deep submersible continued to descend, and engineer Qu kept in touch with the ship through the ultrasonic phone. The creatures in the sea gradually decreased. When he dived to 100 meters, Yang Jixian saw a strange octopus flashing past in the distance.Xu Zhenyu still didn't see any abnormality in the cable. When the depth gauge showed 150 meters, Ke Hua asked on the ultrasonic phone: "Xiao Xu, how are you feeling?" "I feel good about myself," Xu Zhenyu said. "Director Ke, I saw a red grouper!" Yang Jixian said happily as he grabbed the ultrasound phone. "It's almost 210 meters, we need to step up observation." Ke Hua's strong voice came from the phone. "Yes." Xu Zhenyu replied. Except for the beam of light, the sea was pitch black.Under the strong pressure of sea water, the deep submersible made a slight sound. "Look!" Xu Zhenyu finally found out that the cable was broken, and pointed to Engineer Qu. Engineer Qu stopped the submersible and let it get closer.He looked at the depth gauge and reported up: "The cable was found broken at a water depth of 205 meters, and we were going to try it with a manipulator." A mechanical hand slowly stretched out, tightly grasping a cable head.Engineer Qu took a closer look, and it seemed that something forcibly pulled it away.He asked the other manipulator to take a knife to peel off the rubber of the broken cable.This manipulator is specially used to salvage sunken ships, and it looks a bit clumsy when doing this job.Thanks to his proficient operation, he finally connected the broken core wire. However, when he wanted to wrap the joint with underwater tape, the manipulator struggled and failed to wrap it. Yang Jixian looked very anxious, so he demanded: "Qugong, let me sneak outside and bandage up!" Engineer Qu is still making the final effort, hoping that the manipulator will finally complete the task. "If you don't go out to deal with it, it will be even more difficult when the tide comes up!" Yang Jixian urged. This sentence reminded the salvage engineer, he no longer hesitated, and agreed with Yang Jixian to work outside. Yang Jixian skillfully put on the light diving suit, put on the gas cylinder, put on the respirator and protective goggles, pedal the flippers, put on the lead pressure, put on the laser gun, and took the underwater tape and the diving camera given to him by his father. , after being pressurized in the corridor, drilled to the outside. He swam to the end of the cable and took out his diving camera to take pictures.The cables were then wrapped with underwater tape while wearing gloves.The strong water pressure made him tired quickly, and his hands felt numb, making bandaging very difficult.In a hurry, he simply took off his gloves and continued to wrap them. The searchlight on the deep submersible flickered, which was Engineer Qu urging him to go back quickly.He insisted on finishing the last bit of work.At this time, he felt itchy skin all over his body and pain in his joints.He realized right away that decompression sickness was haunting him.He was just swimming back when a large squid suddenly came into view.He didn't want to bother with it at first, but the squid stretched out one of its long legs and shook hard at the cable he had just wrapped, trying to tear it off. Yang Ji was in a hurry, kicked on his flippers, and slowly swam to the back of its oblate body.But the squid noticed it anyway, turned its pale body around, and stared at him with a pair of big weird and ugly eyes.Taking advantage of his unpreparedness, Yang Jixian took out his laser pistol and swept it towards the long leg that was pulling the cable. The long leg broke off immediately and slowly fell into the abyss.The squid was in excruciating pain, and spewed out a thick, fishy black juice.It stretched out its other long leg angrily, trying to roll him over.With a flash of Yang Jixian's instinct, that huge and powerful long leg has pulled his weight down.Yang Jixian hurriedly turned around to grab it, but unexpectedly the lead had fallen to the bottom of the sea.He raised his laser gun and fired at the squid again.The squid struggled a few times and gradually sank.The submersible reached out to him.But he had lost his balance, and he weakly grabbed the mechanical arm twice, but he couldn't reach it.He floated up faster and faster, like a ping pong ball under the water suddenly lost any control. Engineer Qu could see clearly in the deep submersible, and was surprised.He immediately shouted to the water: "Yang Jixian was released, please prepare to rescue him!" Xu Zhenyu was very anxious.After he confirmed that the cable had been processed, the deep submersible quickly rose to the surface.Booms quickly hoisted them onto the rear deck. When they came out, under the light of the restored searchlight, the giant hand had safely disengaged from the spacecraft. Yang Jixian was also rescued and sent to the decompression chamber on the "Hercules".To nurse him, the dive doctor accompanied him into the decompression chamber. This decompression chamber is very much like a cannon cartridge, and the airtight chamber is filled with high-pressure air.Yang Fan felt very sad when he saw his younger brother's painful face from the window.Xu Zhenyu came over and said to her gently: "Send a telegram to your father?" Two tears rolled from her eyes, she shook her head, and said in a barely audible voice: "Let's wait until tomorrow's condition improves, otherwise the two old people will be in a hurry." Xu Zhenyu nodded sympathetically.He wanted to say something soothing, but seeing her sad look, he thought it would be better if he didn't say anything.