Crew Members Rejoin Civilization After Spending an Entire Year in Mars Simulation

Crew Members Rejoin Civilization After Spending an Entire Year in Mars Simulation
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The six crew members of HI-SEAS have rejoined the outside world after enduring a yearlong Mars simulation in a 1,200 square foot dome perched 8,000 feet up on the slope of a Hawaiian volcano.

The HI-SEAS mission, which stands for Hawaiian Space Exploration Analog and Simulation, was funded by NASA and administered by the University of Hawaii. Held each year, the simulation tests the physiological and psychological effects of living with a small group of people in isolation from the world for extended periods of time.

For 365 days, the crew, comprised of three men and three women, lived together in close quarters in the dome, and were forced to wear spacesuits whenever they stepped foot outside onto the desolate volcanic terrain in order to create a situation analogous to an extended stay on the Red Planet. The team was resupplied with water every 2 months and food every 4 months. They were also given limited Internet access to stay in touch with friends and family, with a 20-minute delay to mimic the lag that occurs when transmitting a message between Earth and Mars. Overall, however, the consensus was that the biggest challenges were fighting to stave off boredom and cabin fever.

While tensions between crewmembers rose periodically under such cramped and monotonous conditions, emergencies had the effect of galvanizing the team and boosting cooperation. According to NPR, such an emergency came when the water treatment and storage system broke a few months into the experiment, forcing crewmembers to bathe with buckets for weeks.

In a video posted on Twitter, Christiane Heinicke, a German physicist who was part of the team, described the incident that forced everyone to come together. “Obviously, we need water, so we all needed to work on that as a group,” Heinicke recalled. “If you had some arguments within the group… it really helps to have an emergency to work on together, because everyone has new motivation,” she stated.

The next two HI-SEAS missions are slated to last for eight months and will commence in 2017 and 2018.

Featured Image: Big Island Now
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