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One-year Mars mission begins atop Hawaiian volcano


Canadian Hi-SEAS crew member Ross Lockwood explores outside the habitat during his mission in 2014. Credit: Hi-SEAS


Scott Sutherland
Meteorologist/Science Writer

Monday, August 31, 2015, 3:53 PM - Although humanity is a decade or more away from actually setting foot on the Red Planet, that's not stopping six brave souls from experiencing what it would be like to live on Mars for an entire year.

Hi-SEAS, the Hawaii Space Exploration Analog and Simulation, has begun its latest mission atop one of the largest volcanoes on Earth, testing out the supplies, methodologies, technologies and human endurance, in preparation for sending humans on future journeys to Mars.

This time - the fourth in the project's run so far - its participants are in it for the long haul, spending an entire year together as if they were actually living on the surface of the Red Planet.

After "landing" on August 28, 2015, a crew of six is now living in a specially-designed habitat on the barren Mars-like slopes of Mauna Loa, eating packaged food and only experiencing the outside world while decked out in something akin to what astronauts wear when they're repairing the International Space Station.

Compare the above view of "sMars" (simulated Mars) with white-balanced images sent back by NASA's Curiosity rover, and (besides the clouds) it would be hard to tell it apart from Gale Crater on the real Mars.


Image credit: Pete Roma/University of Hawaii System

The team members, from left to right:

  • Crew Commander Carmel Johnston - a soil scientist from Whitefish, Montana

  • Chief Scientific Officer & Crew Physicist Christiane Heinicke - German physicist and engineer

  • Chief Engineering Officer Andrzej Stewart - pilot and ex-Lockheed Martin interplanetary flight controller (for six different space missions)

  • Health Science Officer & Habitat Journalist Sheyna Gifford - NASA contributor, researcher in astrophysics, neuroscience & psychology and science journalist

  • Crew Biologist Cyprien Verseux - astrobiology doctorate student at the University of Rome

  • Crew Architect Tistan Bassingthwaighte - doctor of architecture candidate at University of Hawaii Mānoa

The first Hi-SEAS mission began back in April 2013, with a crew spending four months "offworld," primarily to study the kinds of foods that would be best for potential Mars explorers. The idea was to find what would not only provide them with the nutrition they would need during the mission, but also what would give them enough "home comforts" and variety to make their adventure a more enjoyable one.

The missions since then have continued to examine the foodstuffs of an interplanetary journey, but have also focused on crew relations and the various problems that will be faced on a trip to Mars and back, while pushing the duration as well. While Hi-SEAS 1 and 2 were both four-months long, Hi-SEAS 3 lasted nearly eight months - from October 15, 2014 to June 13, 2015 - and the latest mission is going for a full year.


Habitat exterior


Habitat 1st floor


Habitat 2nd floor

Image credits: Hi-SEAS/Envision Design. Click or tap images to enlarge.

Just as we'll likely see from any future, real-life mission to Mars, the participants are more than happy to share their experiences with us here "at home" - including their daily meals (which are far from the tubes of paste that our earliest space explorers were forced to endure.

Listen to some of the brightest minds of our time - Stephen Hawking, for example - the message for humanity is clear. For our species to survive long-term, it's not just about achieving some kind of lasting peace with each other. If we remain bound to just this one planet - Earth - we are very likely doomed to suffer a planet-wide catastrophe, such as an asteroid impact like the one that decimated the dinosaurs. Therefore, to avoid extinction, we must become a multi-planet species.

Missions like Hi-SEAS are helping us to work out the details of these missions, to prepare us for the time when we do venture out to settle on other, less-hospitable planets.

Follow along with the crew at the Hi-SEAS website, @HI_SEAS on Twitter, and the project page on Facebook.

Source: Hi-SEAS Mission 4

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