My Little Pony: My Little Pony The Martian

Mission Log – Solar Day 241

I just want to ask, beg this planet not to harm me and my friends again. Is my wish too much? ah? !

Apparently there was such a dust storm, and even though it was still on the other side of the planet, it acted like it was coming specifically for me. And based on what I know about this damn planet, there is a high probability that I will make a special trip to visit you. "To my number one fan, Mark Watney, thank you for everything, Mars. P.S. Ganlin Niang."

However, the research on Mars weather forecast is still in its infancy, and errors are inevitable. This dust storm won't arrive for at least another six days, and it may turn around and leave; that is, of course, if our luck improves in time. But at the same time, NASA has ordered us to prepare to go to the cave farm for temporary shelter, which means that we have to move all the remaining food packages and a small inventory of hay and potatoes back to the farm, as well as bring all the medical supplies and some clutter.

In addition, we also need to thoroughly check the area around the living cabin, especially the windward side (east side), which needs to be prepared. Inflatable tents must be emptied and deflated. The pile of scrap metal parts also needs to be buried to prevent it from being caught in the strong wind and turning into pieces flying everywhere. Check to make sure all solar panels and external power cables are securely in place, otherwise the panels will turn into oversized kites. (As for why this did not happen in the dust storm on Sol 6, part of it is because the panels were nailed to the ground with fixed stakes, but another reason is that the tilted panels were facing the wind at the time, so the dust storm did not blow them in the direction of the wind. In the air, downforce is generated to fix them on the ground.)

But the biggest trouble is the Friendship. We must find a large amount of rocks as ballast for the spacecraft as soon as possible so that it can remain stranded stably when a dust storm strikes. At present, the spacecraft is held high off the ground by the landing gear, and there is no connection except for the landing gear and a power supply line. The dust storm might blow the spacecraft away against the wheel brakes like it did with the MDV's emergency parachute, and then smash it to pieces. If the Friendly was blown over like the MDV before, we would have to buy a bus ticket to Schiaparelli, because our car would definitely not be able to drive.

It was a lot of work and would have taken several days to complete if we continued to spend hours every day visiting the caves to see the dragonflies. So it's a good thing that NASA wants us to start early. The first thing we do is check, after all, it is the top priority. Most of the time I was busy driving piles to secure the panels that I had stolen from the solar array when I went to find the Pathfinder and never actually put them back. If it was just for daily use, it wouldn't matter much whether it was fixed or not, but now that Mars Hurricane 2 is coming to the door, everything must be firmly nailed to the ground.

Thinking back to the early days of astronaut training, I first witnessed local hurricane response efforts in Houston. The locals rushed to the stores to buy wooden boards, nails, tape, milk, purified water, canned beans, sausages and other supplies. I was dumbfounded by the battle. But that storm turned north, and by the time it reached Louisiana, it was already at the end of its might and ended in a drizzle; at that time, I naturally laughed at this obviously ridiculous stress reaction.

The next year came Hurricane Bernie. Category 2 hurricane. Eyewall winds reached 95 mph and made landfall on the Bolivar Peninsula. Although it subsided within a few hours after arriving inland, it still had enough energy to sweep through the Johnson Space Center and surrounding areas with hurricane-level storms and rain.

NASA declared an emergency evacuation, but a few people I knew invited me to a hurricane party well above the expected storm surge mark. Vogel was interested in hurricanes, and I was eager to try a cocktail called hurricane, so everyone else quickly evacuated, leaving only us in Webster. I didn't really get into it for a while and thought it was quite fun. Then the power went out about twenty minutes before landing. After that, the only sound we could hear besides conversation was the howling wind.

This wind is amazing. The roaring wind enveloped the entire house and shook the entire building - but the wind speed was "only" seventy miles per hour. The storm seems eager to peel off the crispy wooden shell of the house and suck out the soft, fragile, tender and juicy human flesh and blood inside.

A few of the windows were not boarded up, so I could get a glimpse of the outside. All kinds of things were blown around in the wind, and large tree branches and metal panels could also be seen. What's more amazing is that it didn't rain much. The host told me that this is not a strange thing. Most of the time, the heavy rains don't start falling until the hurricane slows down, which is one of the reasons Harvey is particularly notorious for stalling almost immediately after making landfall and refusing to leave. . They went on to say that in comparison, this storm would only bring about eight to 10 inches of rain.

You heard that right. "Only" eight to ten inches of precipitation.

Then the other guests talked about Hurricane Ike—the storm that led to plans to build the Ike Dam, which was finally going to be built after so many years of delays. A few old comrades still remember Tropical Storm Allison, which was like a mini-Harvey. There was also an old lady present who told us the story of Hurricane Alicia, when all the skyscraper windows in downtown Houston were blown out by the unstoppable winds.

These people here came prepared with their bottles of water and bean stew because they had been through real disasters—and they chose to stay because to them, Hurricane Bernie was nothing. , is a rookie player who doesn’t know the depth and has a good eye but a weak hand. The preparations they have made are not unfounded, but just prove that everything is under control.

The party continued like this, but the howling wind gradually lost its strength and finally became calm. The local people can be so calm and calm in the face of disasters. This level of calmness is incredible to me. Vogel was also quite shocked. At that time, he seemed to have said something like "wehrsinnig -> wahnsinnig" that Americans are all crazy. Sorry, I don't know anything about German.

As we were chatting, I mentioned to them how exciting this behavior was, and the party host’s response was that their residence was above the predicted water level of the storm surge. According to them, run when you see water and hide when you see wind. It was obvious that the capacity of existing roads was simply not enough to allow everyone in the area expected to be affected by the storm to evacuate to safety. (Several well-wishers also told me horror stories: driving until they ran out of gas on Interstate 45 to avoid Hurricane Rita; four million people blocking two hundred miles of highway to avoid the wind. parking lot. As a result, this storm that everyone was avoiding never set foot within the eighty-mile radius of Houston.)

The next day we both went to volunteer at the Red Cross to see if there was anything we could do to help, but there wasn't much to do. Facility maintenance trucks sent from other states were scurrying around the streets repairing power lines, and most businesses — as long as they didn't have their roofs ripped off or their windows smashed — reopened the day after the storm. In total, only three people were killed - that familiar "only" again. After another month, everything returned to calm, and the storm left no trace. Of course, if you go to the Bolivar Peninsula, you can still see the devastation of everything being flattened again.

I will never again laugh at Texans who rush to buy milk bread en masse. But I still think they are not mentally normal.

Having said all that, what does it have to do with things on Mars? We can't escape by running. First of all, we can't figure out the direction of the dust storm, and no matter how hard we run, we can only move up to 70 kilometers in a certain direction. Even if the dust storm writes the itinerary in black and white for our reference, we cannot escape from its grasp.

So we just have to take cover where we are and thank God it won't rain on Mars.

Having said that, it would be great if there were milk bread and/or bean sausage stew now.