Four scientists completed a 378-day mission in Martian conditions for NASA in Houston, USA, on Saturday to better prepare for a possible human settlement on the Red Planet.
An astronaut from the American agency knocks three times on a seemingly ordinary door. “Ready to go out?” he asks enthusiastically.
The response from inside is inaudible. Under his mask, he seems to crack a smile as he snaps open the door. Four scientists come out to cheers.
Anca Selariu, Ross Brockwell, Nathan Jones and team leader Kelly Haston spent 378 days trapped in a “Mars habitat” in Houston, Texas, as part of a NASA study.
All the while, they grew vegetables, walked on red sand and labored under “additional stressors” including isolation, confinement and slowed communication with “Earth” and their families.
Somewhat disheveled, the four researchers return outside with undisguised pleasure.
“Hello. Actually, it’s so great to just be able to say hello,” smiles Kelly Haston, a biologist by trade.
“I hope I’m not going to cry right here in front of you,” said Nathan Jones, an emergency room doctor, grabbing the microphone. A pious wish, since he would cry a few moments later when he saw his wife in the crowd who had come to congratulate his team.
Mr Jones and his comrades will have lived for more than a year in “Mars Dune Alpha”, a 160 square metre structure built by 3D printers with bedrooms, a gym, common areas and even a vertical farm to grow their own food.
In another area separated from the habitat by an airlock and covered with red sand, the scientists carried out their “Martian walks”.
The team spent their entire mission “conducting crucial scientific research, primarily based on nutrition, and determining its effects on their performance […] “As we prepare to send humans to the Red Planet,” said Steve Koerner, deputy director of NASA’s Johnson Space Center.
“I am very grateful,” he added.
It was the first of three missions in NASA’s Analogue crew health and performance exploration project.
Another one-year mission simulating life on Mars had already taken place between 2015 and 2016 in a habitat in Hawaii, but although the American agency participated, it was not in command.
As part of its Artemis program, Washington plans to send humans back to the Moon to better understand how to live far from Earth in the long term and thus prepare for a trip to Mars that could take place in the late 2030s.