NASA officials reveal what life was like for a year in a Mars simulation and say the United States could potentially reach the red planet “by the end of the next decade.”
Commander Kelly Haston, Flight Engineer Ross Brockwell, Medical Officer Dr. Nathan Jones and Science Officer Anca Selariu lived in a 157-square-meter Mars habitat for 378 days to study and plan future missions.
“It was really a great opportunity to work with all the NASA staff and experts there,” Jones told Fox News Digital. “The day-to-day was pretty similar to what you would expect from a real Mars mission or maybe even a moon mission. Essentially, we would get up in the morning, have a quick breakfast, and have some sort of team meeting, followed by mission-realistic activities.”
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The crew practiced walking on the surface of Mars in a so-called “sandbox.”
“It feels like you’re walking out onto the surface of Mars,” he explained. “Then we also had virtual spacewalks where it felt like you were actually walking on Mars. Surface of Mars for longer periods of time.”
The crew experimented with growing various plants such as tomatoes and lettuce in an AeroGarden using hydroponics.
“I think we learned a lot about how a food system works and how a training program might work, what the habitat design — as it was in this iteration — would look like, how the teams could get along and be effective and also have fun while they were in that kind of situation,” Brockwell reflected. “So I think we learned a lot.”
The crew was able to make contact with the outside world, but with a time delay to simulate communication on Mars.
“It takes about 20 minutes for the signal to arrive, and then if you want to send something back to me, it takes 20 minutes for it to get to me. That’s not including the recording time and the bandwidth,” Jones explained.
The medical officer told Fox News Digital that the simulation allowed the crew to research what medical technology would be most useful on a mission to Mars and how the crew would respond, taking into account communication delays in getting the information to officials on Earth.
“If you were on a real Mars mission, you would bring surgical supplies and things like that,” Jones told Fox News Digital. “Now, in a simulation, it’s probably not worth the risk to the crew members to have an emergency surgeon operate. They would have gotten them out and taken care of them appropriately, but on a real Mars mission, I could communicate with a real surgeon who is more specialized in something and actually perform the procedure.”
Jones said the biggest obstacle in a Mars mission is the time it takes to get there. With a one-way trip taking nine months, the crew must be adequately supplied and able to survive a long period of isolation from their loved ones.
“If we could just shorten the trip a little bit, that would be very helpful, not only in getting the teams there, but also in getting the supplies they need,” he said.
Although team members were separated from their families, they didn’t miss the opportunity to celebrate the holidays together by making homemade Christmas decorations, baking birthday cakes, and decorating their living space with LED lights.
“It was a lot of fun,” Brockwell recalls. “We tried to stay connected to the earth in different ways – for example, we celebrated birthdays and holidays along the way. That meant a lot to us.”
Brockwell and Jones both expressed their delight at the opportunity to learn more about Mars in the simulation.
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“It was pretty amazing,” said Brockwell. “I think it was as realistic as you could possibly want it to be, given that it’s on Earth, but it was very interesting and exciting from start to finish. It was great.”
“Supporting this kind of exploration and the space program is so important to the United States of America and to the world,” Brockwell said. “I think sometimes, given everything that’s going on in the world, people wonder if this is a good use of time and resources, and I think it is. I mean, we learn so much from this, from a practical standpoint, but also just from the standpoint of what’s possible. It’s really inspiring. I think these kinds of goals help to inspire and unite humanity. So I hope there’s widespread understanding and enthusiasm for this.”
