Over 70 Years of Time, He Gave All the Light and Heat of His Life to the Aviation Cause
A Profile of Yao Zhicheng, Metallographic Analysis Expert at AVIC Shenyang Aircraft Corporation——
Seventy-Plus Years of Microscopic Exploration: Where There Is Will, There Is a Way
■ Tian Bo
Recent photograph of Yao Zhicheng. Photo by Chen Yang
On a recently publicized list of candidates for commendation as National Outstanding Communist Party Members, there is one veteran Party member who has spent a lifetime living out his founding aspirations — Yao Zhicheng, a metallographic analysis expert at Shenyang Aircraft Corporation Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as AVIC Shenyang Aircraft, or Shenyang Aircraft), aged 96. He has been rooted in the metallographic inspection post for more than 70 years and continues to serve "beyond retirement age."
Metallographic analysis is the first checkpoint for aviation metallic materials. Through the small field of a microscope, Yao Zhicheng leaves no grain pattern, hairline crack, or internal defect in metal with anywhere to hide. With rigorous judgments that tolerate not the slightest error, he has quietly stood guard over the safety of fighter jets soaring through the blue sky.
"Where there is will, there is a way (有志者事竟成)." Perhaps because the characters "Zhicheng" appear in his own name, this saying has become his personal motto. Seventy-plus years of microscopic exploration are precisely its embodiment.
Choosing this work meant being destined for obscurity
At three-thirty in the morning, the stars above Shenyang have not yet faded and the night is still deep. In an old residential building near the AVIC Shenyang Aircraft factory grounds, a light comes on. Ninety-six-year-old Yao Zhicheng carefully straightens his blue work uniform, washed to a faded white, and steps out through the door into the cool morning mist. He has walked this road connecting home and work unit for 71 springs and autumns. His steps have grown increasingly unsteady, yet the direction in his heart has never wavered.
Born in 1930 into a farming family in Shanghai, Yao Zhicheng was bright and studious as a child, but with the nation in crisis, his peaceful years of schooling were shattered by the flames of war. When the Battle of Shanghai broke out, the young boy witnessed with his own eyes Japanese warplanes bombing and strafing indiscriminately, and was filled with grief and indignation: "Our great China — why do we suffer such humiliation? Why is the sky filled with nothing but enemy aircraft?"
A burning seed was planted then and there: build China's own fighter jets, and defend the nation's boundless sky!
Because of his family's poverty, Yao Zhicheng entered a grain shop as an apprentice at an early age. The heavy labor did not extinguish his patriotic ambitions. In 1953, Yao Zhicheng fulfilled his wish and was admitted to the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Zhejiang University. Back in school, he cherished this hard-won opportunity all the more. His foundational knowledge was weak, so he compensated with diligence, rising early and staying late, immersing himself in the library and classrooms. During his two years of study, Yao Zhicheng was single-minded and did not return home even once.
In that era, How the Steel Was Tempered was widely read among young people, and the story of Pavel Korchagin devoting his life to his ideals shook him deeply. Yao Zhicheng quietly resolved that after completing his studies, he would dedicate every technique he had learned entirely to the motherland.
In 1955, heeding the nation's call, he bid farewell to his homeland in the Jiangnan region and traveled north to Shenyang, becoming a technician in the metallurgy specialty at State-Owned Factory No. 112 (the predecessor of AVIC Shenyang Aircraft), embarking from that point on a long journey of serving the nation through aviation.
When he first entered the metallographic analysis laboratory, the conditions were far more rudimentary than Yao Zhicheng had expected — a cramped office, a second-hand Soviet-supplied microscope, three or four staff members, and a scant collection of foreign-language materials: that was the sum total of their resources.
Some have called the somewhat "niche" profession of metallographic inspection engineer the "internist" of aviation metallic materials. Metal alloys of every variety were the "patients" Yao Zhicheng faced day in and day out. Whenever a "difficult case" arose, he had to act like an internist performing a diagnosis — through meticulous observation and extensive statistical analysis, he would produce a precise "diagnostic report."
Spending year after year in this small laboratory was tedious and monotonous. Choosing to do this work meant being destined for obscurity. At the time, all technical documentation for fighter aircraft was in Russian. In order to read professional literature and thoroughly master technical standards, Yao Zhicheng set out on a grueling path of self-study.
After finishing his work in the workshop and laboratory, Yao Zhicheng would often walk several kilometers to a nearby university to study Russian. His meager wages were divided into three portions: one sent to his wife in Shanghai, one for his own living expenses, and the remainder spent on books. Whenever new foreign-language books arrived at the bookstore, he would buy them at the first opportunity. According to colleagues, Yao Zhicheng would often make do with two steamed buns and a little salted vegetable for dinner, reciting vocabulary words as he walked. Through summer heat and winter cold, through wind and rain without exception, he gnawed through the "hard bone" of a foreign language.
The industry had long observed a division of labor: in the laboratory, technicians were responsible for drawing analytical conclusions while workers handled the experimental operations. Yao Zhicheng broke with this convention, insisting on personally performing operations and recording every set of data himself. He believed that only by handling materials with his own hands and observing them closely could he truly understand the "temperament" of metals. Years of bending over to observe specimens gradually curved his spine; daily handling of tweezers and grinding of test samples permanently deformed the joints of his right hand, which remains bent in the posture of work at all times.
He fought one such hard battle after another
In 1971, a major test arrived without warning — the J-6 aircraft's primary load-bearing components were using domestically produced new materials for the first time, and the factory discovered during inspection that the materials exhibited a tendency toward low-temperature cold brittleness. Some opinions held that all components of that batch of aircraft that had already been installed should be removed and replaced entirely.
But if carried out, this would not only cause enormous economic losses; the just-emerging development of domestically produced new materials would also face a halt.
At this critical juncture, Yao Zhicheng moved his bedding into the laboratory and worked day and night, repeatedly comparing metallographic charts, poring over vast quantities of literature, and conducting low-temperature simulation tests. Through meticulous analysis and judgment, he reached a conclusion: although the material had cold-brittle characteristics, it would not affect flight safety, and wholesale replacement was unnecessary. This report, which embodied painstaking effort and a sense of responsibility, was submitted up through the chain of command and ultimately received the approval of Premier Zhou Enlai. More than 90 fighter aircraft were able to enter normal service, and the path to applying and promoting domestically produced new materials was thereby opened.
He fought one such hard battle after another. On one occasion, the main beam of a fighter aircraft supplied by a steel plant in Hubei showed suspected defects — "bright spots and bright lines" — during sample testing, and hundreds of aircraft faced the risk of being grounded. Some believed this was hydrogen embrittlement caused by hydrogen in the material, endangering flight safety; Yao Zhicheng firmly held that it was a material segregation problem and that flight safety was not at issue.
Practice is the sole criterion for testing truth. Yao Zhicheng immediately led a team to Hubei, where they stayed at the plant for several months conducting in-depth investigation, confirming his judgment. The alarm was lifted, and the fighter jets that had briefly been "grounded" once again ruled the skies.
Experiments in the aviation field routinely cost millions. Over decades of work on the front lines of aviation industry production, Yao Zhicheng used his solid professional foundation and rigorous work style to overcome key technical difficulties in more than one hundred major aviation scientific research and engineering projects, saving the state enormous experimental costs. In 1992, he was awarded a State Council Special Government Allowance.
At work, Yao Zhicheng was slow to speak but quick to act. He had a habit he maintained for many years: writing notes on slips of paper. Scrap draft paper, medicine package inserts, the backs of receipts — all could serve as his "notepad," used to record operational key points, experimental techniques, or items requiring attention.
Dai Pengfei, a young technician in the metallographic laboratory, recalled the first time he independently carried out an assignment. He had been busy until noon and had just made a simple cup of instant noodles to eat when he noticed a neatly written slip of paper pressed under the bowl, annotating item by item the details of sample grinding, etching, and observation.
For a junior colleague, this brief note was the most considerate of guides. This tradition of "brief notes, deep feeling (纸短情长)" has been passed down from generation to generation in the metallographic laboratory.
In teaching and nurturing others, Yao Zhicheng was patient and thorough. When a junior colleague's thinking went astray, he never directly negated them; instead he guided them gently, inspired their thinking, and shared reference materials and classic texts. When major presentations arose, he willingly stayed in the background and gave younger colleagues the opportunity to present. Under his careful cultivation, a cohort of technical backbone personnel born in the 1980s and 1990s rapidly grew into the core of the metallographic inspection team.
Over the decades, the more than three million characters' worth of technical materials that Yao Zhicheng compiled in his spare time have become a shared asset for the industry. Colleagues say with heartfelt admiration: "Teacher Yao is a 'living textbook' of the metallographic field!"
As long as I don't collapse, I will keep coming to work
Yao Zhicheng is indifferent to fame and material gain. As various honors arrived one after another, and most colleagues who joined at the same time moved into management positions, promotion opportunities were placed before Yao Zhicheng on several occasions — each time, he declined: "Compared to an office, I cannot do without my microscope and laboratory bench."
The old man has lived a plain and low-key life throughout. To this day, he still lives with his second daughter in an old-style apartment of 80 square meters, wears the work uniform issued by his work unit year-round, and cannot bring himself to replace a pair of shoes even after they have been mended multiple times. Because he has spent years rooted in the laboratory, leaving early and returning late, neighbors who have lived in the same building for more than twenty years have mostly heard his name but rarely seen the man. "Dad has been plain and simple his whole life — stubborn as an ox. Tell him not to come to work and he won't listen. Offer him a bigger apartment and he says he doesn't pursue such things, that as long as he has a place to live it's fine," said his second daughter, Yao Jinglian. "In his whole life, Dad has only made two requests of his work unit: one, that he be allowed to continue working after retirement; and two, that he be given a set of blue work uniforms."
In 1990, Yao Zhicheng retired. When the news spread, several companies came to his door with generous salary offers — all of which he flatly refused. "Shenyang Aircraft is my home; the metallographic laboratory is my post. I still want to keep working." He voluntarily applied to return to his post without pay. Later, when the work unit grew concerned about his advanced age and declining health, the old man stubbornly wrote out a personal pledge in his own hand: he voluntarily chose to work on the job; personal safety was his own responsibility and had nothing to do with the work unit.
The sunset clouds still fill the sky (莫道桑榆晚，为霞尚满天). For more than 30 years since retirement, his daily routine has never changed: rising punctually at three-thirty every morning, eating a simple breakfast, walking two kilometers to the factory grounds, bringing his own packed lunch and dinner, and not returning home until evening — never missing a day for wind or rain. Family members have repeatedly urged him to stop; he still sets out on time. In 2013, 2019, and 2021, he suffered accidental bone fractures on three separate occasions, each time regarded by doctors as a serious case given his advanced age — yet each time, he stood back up through sheer force of will and returned to the laboratory.
Wholly absorbed in his work, he is filled with guilt toward his family. In his early years, he went north to Shenyang and was separated from his family. His young daughter traveled a thousand li to find her father, and when they met she was too shy and uncertain to recognize him. His childhood sweetheart and wife, Guo Cuigen, managed the household affairs her entire life; in her later years she fell gravely ill, and he was often unable to be by her side at all times because of work — he even missed her funeral. His eldest daughter died young from overwork; the immense grief was buried in his heart and transformed into the drive to keep going. Fortunately, his family has always understood his choices and has supported his work without wavering.
Past ninety years of age, his learning and research have not stopped. This "post-90s" individual considers himself still young. In recent years, he has undertaken the translation of the American Metals Handbook; when his eyesight fails him he moves closer to the light, and when his energy is limited he advances section by section. He says that while he can still hold a pen, leaving behind more materials means being able to help young people more. On holidays and even on New Year's Eve, the light in the metallographic laboratory is often on. While others gather with their families, he is still bent over his desk, organizing materials and analyzing test samples.
Over more than 70 years, from a spirited young man to an elder of advanced age (鲐背之年), Yao Zhicheng, like Pavel Korchagin, has given all the light and heat of his life to the magnificent aviation cause. On the writing desk in his home sits a copy of Readings in the Chinese Spirit (《中国精神读本》). He often tells his family: "We who work in aviation must have a spirit and drive (精气神). As long as I don't collapse, I will keep coming to work."
Illustration: Yang Lei