Reborn in the red age

The Baikonur Cosmodrome is very large, but the area open to Li Qingfeng and others is very small.

Only the area where the satellite is about to be launched is open to Li Qingfeng and others, and they are not allowed to get too close.

On the second day after arriving, Li Qingfeng wanted to see the satellite that was about to be launched, but his proposal was rejected on the grounds that the satellite had already been installed and there were other satellites on the rocket.

This made Li Qingfeng very unhappy. He spent more than 20 million US dollars, but he was not even allowed to see a physical satellite. Is this how you do things?

This is the only time. From now on, even if you beg me to come to your place to launch, I won’t come.

After spending two days at the Baikonur Cosmodrome and listening to Mou Qizhong's snoring for two nights, when Li Qingfeng was feeling a little irritated, the time for the satellite launch finally arrived.

We were taken to the satellite launch viewing area by the local staff. On the way, the Russian leader proudly introduced the history of the Baikonur Cosmodrome to everyone.

"The Baikonur Cosmodrome was built in 1955, with a total area of ​​6717 square kilometers. It is the largest space launch site in the world and has created countless firsts in human aviation history. The first manned spacecraft was launched from here."

Listening to the old Russian proudly introducing the glorious history of the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Li Qingfeng showed admiration on his face, but in his heart he was mocking him.

So what if it is the largest in the world? So what if it is the first in countless human aviation history?
Now this place is not under your control, Moscow, but belongs to Kazakhstan. You Russians are just leasing it, but don't you still have to pay rent every year?
After entering the viewing area, someone handed us a telescope and reminded us not to move around. Then the staff left the viewing area.

Watching the staff member's back disappear from his sight, and then looking at the Russian soldier who was staring at him and others with a gun, Li Qingfeng curled his lips in disdain and raised a telescope to look at the huge rocket standing in the distance.

Li Fuqiang, who had just finished taking photos, carefully came to Li Qingfeng and asked with a little concern, "Third brother, will this satellite fail to launch and explode?"

Mou Qizhong, who was happily waiting for the rocket launch, suddenly turned pale when he heard what Li Fuqiang said.

You know, the Russians just focus on launching, not on success or failure.

It would be best if it succeeds. If not, the Russians will not take any responsibility and you will be responsible for all losses.

More than 20 million US dollars were spent on this satellite. If it really failed, it would be nothing to Li Qingfeng, just a drizzle.

But for Mou Qizhong and the other party's Nanfang Group, it was a huge matter.

After all, Nan De invested 15 million US dollars, of which 5 million was borrowed from the bank. This time, Lao Mou was going all in.
Mou Qizhong suppressed his unhappiness and pretended to be calm and said, "Old man, your worry is completely unnecessary. The Russians' aviation strength is not weak and is top-notch in the world. How could the launch fail?"

In other words, it was Li Fuqiang who said these discouraging words. If it was someone else, Lao Mou would have been angry.

Li Fuqiang remained unmoved by what Mou Qizhong said, and continued to speak in a depressing tone: "It's better to be safe than sorry. The satellites we launched to the United States have failed several times. There is no such thing as a foolproof method."

"."

Mou Qizhong's forehead veins throbbed when he heard this. Mou Qizhong had some violent behavior towards others. If he had a verbal conflict with someone on the street, he would fight with his bare chest.

I can't hold back my anger right now.

How high could Li Fuqiang, who had worked in a factory all his life and was a front-line worker before retirement, have such a high emotional intelligence?

The business he did after retirement was still the underwriting type. He was only responsible for production, and how to sell it was none of his business.

Therefore, he had not developed the businessman's skill of observing people's words and expressions, and did not notice the strange look on Mou Qizhong's face at all.

Just as he was about to continue speaking, Li Qingfeng, who noticed that the atmosphere was not right, stopped him: "Okay, Dad, our country is an exception. It was America that hid their satellite and didn't let us check it, which led to the launch failure. Here, everything from rockets to satellites is their own, so the probability of failure is extremely small."

The failure of the Challenger launch in 1986 caused heavy losses, so the United States announced in 1988 that it would withdraw the space shuttle from commercial launches. At the same time, they signed a satellite launch contract with a country, entrusting the country to use rockets to help them launch multiple commercial satellites.

The launch failure that Mr. Li mentioned was the failure case of the first launch of the Austar B1 satellite.

At that time, the country was very confident and even organized a live TV broadcast to show the country's strength to the people. However, after the ignition, the satellite did not take off, but instead emitted bursts of white smoke, as if it was about to explode.

The embarrassment at the scene was broadcast live on television to the whole world, causing the country to lose face internationally.

“That’s right.”

Li Fuqiang wanted to continue speaking, but his father-in-law Hu Yuanshan stopped him and said with a smile: "My dear, don't be so discouraged. Two months ago, the Austar B3 we launched to the United States was successfully launched. This shows that the success rate of satellite launches is still quite high."

"Dad, look at what you are saying. The satellite is about to ignite. What are you talking about? Aren't you cursing the failure of our own satellite launch?"

As soon as Li Hongmei started to complain about Li's father's nonsense, Li's eldest sister-in-law Zheng Lili and eldest sister Li Yumei also started to criticize him.

Faced with the accusations from his own daughter and daughter-in-law, Father Li opened his mouth and stopped talking about the launch failure. Instead, he raised his telescope and looked at the satellite in the distance.

Without Li Fuqiang's spoiler, the atmosphere on the scene was still very lively. Everyone pointed at the big rocket in the distance and kept discussing the spectacular scene that would follow. This caused the foreigners in the viewing area to point fingers at Li Qingfeng and others.

Soon, the large speaker above the viewing area sounded, notifying that the satellite was about to enter the ignition process.

After the countdown reached one, a dazzling fire instantly illuminated the entire sky, and the huge roar was deafening.

Li Qingfeng and the others subconsciously narrowed their eyes, staring closely at the rocket with flames coming out of its base, waiting for it to slowly rise.

Li Fuqiang, who had just been saying discouraging words, quickly stood up from his position at the moment the rocket was ignited, and stood in front to direct He Guangqin to take a photo of him and the satellite.

Looking at the slowly rising satellite, Mu Qizhong stood up, clenched his fists, and stared at the rising satellite.

Noticing Mou Qizhong's nervousness, Li Qingfeng smiled, pulled Mou Qizhong to sit down, and said jokingly, "Old Mou, don't be nervous. The rocket has been launched. Whether it will succeed or not is not up to us to decide now. Relax. You see, I'm not nervous. At most, I'll just watch a spectacular firework show."

"."

"More than 20 million US dollars worth of fireworks." The corners of Mou Qizhong's mouth twitched. He looked at Li Qingfeng speechlessly, loosened his fist, and slowly sat down again.

Although the timing was wrong, the launch went smoothly. The satellite and rocket separated successfully, and the rocket successfully sent the satellite into the predetermined orbit.

There was a warm cheer in the viewing area, and Li Qingfeng and others also clapped excitedly to celebrate, with the loudest voices coming from the first and fifteenth children.

Looking at the sky with only a wisp of white smoke left, the mother-in-law who watched the whole process clapped her hands and sighed: "Oh, the launch was successful. When I first heard about it, I thought it was a joke. Who would have thought it would be successful? It's like a dream."

"Qingfeng, Boss Mou, you two have really done something that will go down in history by having a private enterprise launch a satellite. Just based on this, you two will be able to leave your names in history in the future," said the father-in-law Hu Yuanshan, stopping clapping his hands and looking at the two people next to him with a smile.

When Mou Qizhong heard Hu Yuanshan's words, he felt so happy. Who doesn't want to be remembered in history?

Mou Qizhong, an ordinary man who had never been to college and came from a working-class family, actually launched a satellite. An indescribable sense of pride surged in his heart, and he could only smile foolishly.

Li Qingfeng didn't react as much as he did. He smiled and waved his hands, saying modestly, "Dad, it's a bit too much to be remembered in history. This is not a satellite we launched ourselves, but a transponder rented from a Russian satellite. It doesn't have that much influence."

Hu Yuanshan nodded slightly, his eyes still full of admiration: "Having said that, this is also a remarkable achievement. For a private enterprise to reach this point, it has already set a precedent in history and will have far-reaching impact."

"Yes, brother, this is no small matter after all. This time, we have allowed people all over the country to see the potential of private enterprises. The road ahead will only become wider and wider. In less than ten or eight years, our satellite company may be able to design satellites independently." Mou Qizhong also came back to his senses from his excitement and took over the conversation.

Li Qingfeng nodded and secretly curled his lips in his heart. With the way you're doing things, it won't take ten or eight years, maybe three to five years. If I want to see you again, I'll probably have to apply for a prison visit.

Within ten minutes after the launch, Mou Qizhong instructed his secretary to quickly hand over the photos just taken and the details of the satellite launch to the staff at the launch site, and asked them to send them to the country via email for newspaper publicity.

Seeing the secretary was about to leave, Li Fuqiang hurriedly and loudly reminded: "Don't forget to write my name in the newspaper."

"."

The rocket launch was successfully completed, the main purpose had been achieved, and the rest had nothing to do with Li Qingfeng.

He asked everyone to leave the viewing area and prepare to take the afternoon bus. After arriving in Moscow, he would fly directly back home.

"Hey, there are still a lot of things to do next, are you just going to leave like this?" Mu Qizhong stopped Li Qingfeng who was about to leave and said in shock.

Li Qingfeng spread his hands: "I came here to watch the satellite launch. Now that the satellite has been successfully launched, do I have anything else to do?"

"No, you. me. him"

"All that's left is to hold a few more meetings with the aviation group. It'll be fine as long as you're the full representative. It doesn't matter whether I'm there or not."

Li Qingfeng was too lazy to care about the rest of the trivial matters. There was really no point in renting the transponder. Li Qingfeng didn't even care about the income from the rental.

To put it bluntly, given the size of Lemon Company, if it were to tighten up a little on non-essential expenses, it could save five million dollars a year. There is really no reason for it to be interested in the satellite leasing business.

The main purpose of joining this partnership is to shock the domestic market and make it easier for themselves to negotiate cooperation with major aviation universities, get them to join, and establish a new satellite launch company through joint ventures with domestic universities and aviation groups, or through sole investment, to lay a solid foundation for their Starlink plan.

Seeing Li Qingfeng's look of "I trust you to do the job", Mou Qizhong opened his mouth, not knowing what to say for a moment.

After a long while, Mou Qizhong finally sighed deeply: "It's not easy to get my extra 1% of shares."

"Those who are capable should do more work. Okay, I believe in you."

Li Qingfeng patted Mou Qizhong on the shoulder, left a few words, and walked away gracefully.

In the afternoon, all members of the Li family tour group headed to the airport contentedly by car.

After some trouble, they arrived at Moscow Airport smoothly. Lemon One had already applied for the route, and after picking up Li Qingfeng and his family, it took off directly and flew towards China.

Since Lemon One applied for a stopover in Shanghai, after landing at the Capital Airport, except for my father-in-law and his wife, everyone else got off Lemon One.

The news of the satellite launch was about to be published in the newspaper, and Li Fuqiang was thinking about going home quickly to show off to his relatives and friends.

Therefore, he rejected Li Qingfeng's invitation, and despite the fatigue of the long journey, he asked Li Qingfeng to buy him a ticket to the provincial capital today and flew directly back to the provincial capital.

Faced with Li's father who was eager to go back, Zheng Lili and Li Yumei had no choice but to give up the idea of ​​resting in Sijiu City and followed Li Fuqiang back to his hometown.

Just like that, the tour group officially disbanded, and apart from Li Qingfeng's family, only Ma Wenhui and his younger sister Li Hongmei were left.

The next day after returning home, the news of the satellite launch was published in the newspaper.

Major domestic newspapers reported this feat of a private enterprise launching a satellite with eye-catching headlines and large photos.

"The rise of private power! Private enterprises go beyond the country and head for space, and the successful launch of the satellite opens a new journey"

"Historic breakthrough! Satellite launched, private enterprises demonstrate technological strength"

The newspaper used a large amount of space to describe in detail the launch process and the significance of the successful satellite launch.

At the same time, he also highly praised the courage of Li Qingfeng and Mou Qizhong, calling them pioneers and role models for China's scientific and technological and economic development.

Li Qingfeng quickly skimmed through the newspaper, skimming over his own name and the words of praise.

I finally breathed a sigh of relief after seeing Li Fuqiang's name in an inconspicuous corner.

Isn't that what the old man wants? If his name didn't appear in the newspaper, he would be so angry at home. (End of this chapter)