An unforgettable lesson: quality is the life of spaceflight
Dongfeng-2
On March 21, 1962, our country’s first independently developed ballistic missile, "Dongfeng-2", was launched from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Site. Unexpectedly, the missile lost control soon after takeoff, and finally crashed into the Gobi, only 300 meters away from the launch tower, blasting a large crater with a diameter of 30 meters.
All the test participants were dumbfounded. Lin Jin, the chief missile commander of the "Dongfeng No. 2", circled the crater created by the missile and said in tears, "This crater is mine, I’m going to bury it here."
The fall of Dongfeng-2 (source: video))
Many years later, Sun Jiadong couldn’t let go of the failure.
Sun Jiadong:"It fell, a few hundred meters away from you. I didn’t have the slightest idea in my head that I would come down if I made this thing up? At that time, I was dumbfounded and confused. Especially when you are in the big desert, you are standing in the east, and the launch point is exactly in the west. At that time, the sun has already set, and half of the sky is red."
Desert Gobi outside Jiuquan Satellite Launch Site (Photo:Zhang Mian Mian)
In order to find out the reason for the failure, in the icy desert, hundreds of people bent over and fumbled inch by inch, looking for the fragments of the missile. Some people couldn’t help but wipe tears while picking it up. For several days, the sand was almost peeled off, and Sun Jiadong and his colleagues found all the fragments and reassembled the missile. Check one by one, and they found the root cause of the failure.
Sun Jiadong:"In the end, I found that a wire was broken, and there was more than a meter left. After an X-ray, it was broken inside. It was in such a few big failures that I realized that quality is life, and quality is everything in aerospace."
Every time he launched, sitting in the command hall, Sun Jiadong loved to hear the word "normal". Behind every "normal" was the high recognition of all astronauts that "quality is life", and they always maintained a strict, careful, meticulous and practical work style.
At 18:05 on October 24, 2007, the Long March 3A carrier rocket carrying our country’s first lunar exploration satellite Chang’e-1 was launched from the No. 3 tower of Xichang Satellite Launch Center. (Source: Shanghai Securities News)
Dongfanghong No. 1 satellite was successfully launched, and he was proud!
Sun Jiadong summed up his career this way: 7 years learning to fly, 9 years building missiles, and 50 years launching satellites. When it comes to several key life choices, he summed it up in one sentence, which is "If the country needs it, I will do it."
On the eve of studying in the Soviet Union in 1951, Sun Jiadong was a Russian translator for the Air Force at that time
In 1957, Sun Jiadong, who was studying in the Soviet Union, listened to Chairperson Mao’s famous words in the auditorium of Moscow University: "The world is yours and ours, but in the final analysis it is yours. You young people are full of vitality and prosperity, like the sun at eight or nine in the morning, and hope rests on you."
When Chairperson Mao spoke for the first time, and Sun Jiadong heard it for the first time, the blood of the young people boiled in an instant. He said, "At that time, he made up his mind to do whatever the country needs you to do."
In 1967, Qian Xuesen personally appointed the 38-year-old Sun Jiadong as the technical director of the "Dongfanghong No. 1". After nine years of missile research, he began to "turn", thus starting the satellite business for his life.
On April 24, 1970, our country’s first man-made earth satellite "Dongfanghong No. 1" was successfully launched, and our country became the fifth country in the world to be able to launch man-made satellites. Sun Jiadong bluntly said that the biggest feeling of the successful launch of "Dongfanghong No. 1" is "proud".
On April 24, 1970, our country’s first artificial earth satellite "Dongfanghong No. 1" was successfully launched.
Sun Jiadong: "After the announcement, we immediately ran to Tiananmen Square, but after we arrived, we couldn’t get in. The crowds were celebrating, and it was a sense of accomplishment. Excited! I’m not a literary person, so I can’t describe it. "
Sun Jiadong, who is 90 years old this year, has personally participated in and witnessed the whole process of China’s aerospace industry from "a blank sheet of paper" to becoming a space power. It was once estimated that the satellites launched under Sun Jiadong’s leadership accounted for one-third of the first 100 satellites launched by China’s aerospace industry. This aircraft has long been integrated with Sun Jiadong’s life experience.
Sun Jiadong at work (first from left) (Source:Beidou satellite navigation system official WeChat official account)
He is the youngest "two bombs and one star" father and the oldest chief designer of satellite engineering. In 2004, our country officially launched the lunar exploration project, and Sun Jiadong, who is 75 years old, once again took up the role of chief designer of the project. Many people do not understand why Sun Jiadong, who has already achieved success, still accepts this risky job. If he fails, his brilliant aerospace career may be overshadowed. Sun Jiadong still said "If the country needs it, I will do it."
Chang’e-1 successfully hit the moon
In 2007, when the signal of the "Chang’e-1" satellite’s successful orbit around the moon was sent back to the command center, people cheered, hugged, and shook hands to celebrate, but Sun Jiadong walked to a secluded corner alone, turned around, pulled out a handkerchief, and wiped the tears from the corners of his eyes.
Sun Jiadong: "I am so excited that I was born in the hot land of China, and I am fortunate to be able to engage in the development of the aerospace industry. This sense of achievement is truly something that I will never forget in my life. So some people asked me, you have built so many satellites, which one do you feel most excited about? I told them that it is difficult to distinguish, and every time there is something difficult to do. "
Sun Jiadong introduces the importance of aerospace product quality (Photo: Zhang Mian Mian)
Sun Jiadong is left-handed and learned to write with his right hand for school. When he was young, he had the skill of playing table tennis with both arches. At work, he also has a set of tricks of "reverse thinking", often with unexpected and impressive ideas and ideas. Ouyang Ziyuan, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the first chief scientist of China’s lunar exploration project, commented that "Mr. Sun is a’master ‘who is good at simplifying complex problems."
Sun Jiadong (Source:Beidou satellite navigation system official WeChat official account)
The youngest "two bombs and one star" father: Honor goes to the collective
In 2009, on his 80th birthday, Sun Jiadong received a letter signed by 98-year-old Qian Xuesen. In the letter, Qian Xuesen said, "You are a young man whom I admired very much. I heard that you are celebrating your 80th birthday this year. I would like to express my heartfelt congratulations to you! You are an outstanding scientist who grew up in the development of China’s aerospace industry and a witness to China’s aerospace industry…"
Sun Jiadong was interviewed by CCTV reporter Zhang Mian Mian (Photographer: Feng Huiling)
Sun Jiadong, the youngest "two bombs and one star" father, is 90 years old this year. Faced with the well-deserved honor, he said: "I am very uneasy, I am accepting the award for all astronauts."
Sun Jiadong: "The aerospace industry is definitely a collective honor. This thing does not depend on collective achievements, the right time, the right place and the right person. It is absolutely impossible without this. "