Chapter 10 Chapter 6 Gurneymede Turning Greener Day by Day

Ruff van den Berg was born at the right time and in the right place, and no one else can do it better.Of course, this is also the time that creates heroes. He is the right person because he is a second-generation African refugee.And he was a professionally trained geologist, both of which played equally important roles in his life.The reason why he was born in the right place is that it is the largest one among the four satellites of Jupiter: Io, Europa, Gnemede and Callisto - Gnemede, the right place and the right talent. Time is not so critical, because all the data has been in the database for ten years like a delayed bomb.Van den Berg didn't notice them until 2057, and it took him another year to convince himself he wasn't crazy; it wasn't until 2059 that he hid all his original materials from others to copy them his discovery.Only then did he dare to go all out with confidence, ready to solve the main problem: what to do next.

Like most things, the whole thing didn't catch his attention at first. Van den Berg was part of the Interplanetary Engineering Mission tasked with detecting and cataloging natural resources on Jupiter's largest moon, Gnymede. Also conducts some private research work on adjacent forbidden satellites. But Europa (compared to its neighboring moons) is a mystery that no one can ignore.Every seven days, it will pass between Ganymede and the small sun (magic planet) that was once Jupiter, and when Europa passes, it will produce a wood eclipse as long as 12 minutes.When it is closest to Gurneymede, it appears smaller than the moon seen from Earth, but when it is on the other side of its orbit, it shrinks to only a quarter of the size of the moon .

Wood erosion is usually very spectacular. When Europa is about to pass between Gnymede and the magic star, the newly formed sunlight (magic star light) will be refracted by the atmosphere, turning it into an ominous black disk with a dark red circle around it. flame. Europa transforms within half a human lifespan (about fifty years).The icebergs on the side of the hemisphere facing the magic star melted to form the second ocean in the solar system; within ten years, the evaporated water vapor in this ocean rose into the originally vacuum sky, until it reached a state of balance.What is now Europa is surrounded by a thin (not suitable for humans) atmosphere formed by water vapor, hydrogen sulfide, carbon and carbon dioxide, nitrogen and other rare gases.Although the misnamed (backlit side) side remains frozen for a long time, an area the size of Africa now has temperature changes, running water, and a few scattered islands.

The few data above are all observed through telescopes in Earth orbit.By the time the first fully equipped expedition sets off on Galileo's four moons in 2028, Europa will already be shrouded in cloud.Sophisticated radar detectors detect only ocean on one side and ice on the other.Europa remains the most "flat" planet in the solar system. But ten years later, things have changed and something drastic has happened there.It now has a towering mountain (Mount Zeus), almost as high as Earth's Mount Everest, looming alone in the ice at dawn.This may be the result of some volcanic activity (like what has been happening on another moon, Io), causing a massive spout of material into the sky.The heat flow emitted by the magic star may be the main cause.

But there are still some problems with this explanation.Mount Zeus is an irregular pyramid shape, rather than a general volcanic cone; and the scene scanned by radar also shows that there are no traces of volcanic eruption on Europa; The poorly-resolved images also show that Mount Zeus is covered in ice, as is the frozen land that surrounds it.No matter what the answer is, in short, the creation of Mount Zeus was indeed affected by external forces. It turns out that the entire frozen surface on the backlit side of Europa has been completely changed. An unconvinced scientist has another theory of "cosmic hail" on the formation of Mount Zeus: a large piece of comet debris fell from space to Europa and formed Mount Zeus, which can be proved by the scarred Callisto .But the theory wasn't very popular in Gurneymede, where the colonists had enough trouble, so they were relieved when van den Bergh was the most vocal opponent of the theory.Van den Berg believes that if the ice sheet is impacted by an external force of this scale, the surrounding ice cracks will definitely scatter. Even if there is no such thing, according to the effect of Europa's own gravity field, even if the comet wreckage hits moderately, the wreckage will be destroyed very quickly. Just burst.The data from the radar rounds shows that although Mount Zeus is sinking steadily, its shape has not changed at all, so the theory of hailstones does not make sense.

Of course, this question can be found out by sending a needle through the clouds of Europa.But unfortunately, whatever lies beneath that mysterious, almost perpetually dark atmosphere isn't worth much curiosity. The last signal from Discovery before its destruction: "These worlds are all yours, except for Europa. Don't try to log in on it. " Everyone still remembers, but everyone's opinions are still deadlocked.Does pure probing count as "landing"?What if you fly with a vehicle (manned or unmanned) to observe it at a close distance?What about flying a balloon through its atmosphere?

Scientists are anxious to find out, but ordinary people are panicked.What was the force that caused the largest planet in the solar system to explode?It may take centuries to detect Io, Gnemede, Callisto, and many more smaller moons, so there is no rush to detect Europa. Although many people have advised Vandenberg not to waste his precious time studying something that is not practically important, especially when Gnemede has a lot to do (where can I find carbon and phosphorus for hydroponics? , Nitrates? How stable is the Bernard Cliff? Is another landslide dangerous in Feizia? etc.), but he inherited the good face and stubborn nature of his ancestors, even though he has many other plans to do , he would still focus his mind on Europa.

Finally one day, within a few hours, the sky on the backlit side near Mount Zeus suddenly brightened.