Author: jburk

Sol 13 – Field Day for Crew 275

“And in certain houses you heard the hard clatter of a typewriter, the novelist at work; or the scratch

of a pen, the poet at work; or no sound at all, the former beachcomber at work.”

– Chapter 13 of The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury

… or the clatter of a keyboard, the journalist at work! I thought that today, I might take up the beginning of this report to mention what constitutes a significant amount of my time at MDRS. I love that I get to follow and observe each crew member in their assigned work and experiments, as well as participate in their research and lead my own. I am lucky enough to be able to balance out scientific work with more “artistic” activities: taking and editing photos of my crewmates, and doing what I love most, writing.

Today there were many opportunities to take great pictures, as I participated in the first geology EVA of the mission! Alice, our EVA leader, took Adrien, Jérémy, and I to Kissing Camel Ridge, just South of the MDRS. After exploring the area for a short while, Alice gave us instructions to draw the area we explored so that we could make note of where we had collected samples. She showed us how to choose rock samples and test them with the MetMet before collecting them. This instrument allows geologists to test the magnetic susceptibility and conductivity of rocks directly in the field; this way, one can determine the value of potential samples before even beginning to collect them.

It felt great to go a bit further away from the Hab than usual and see different landscapes, and also have new EVA objectives! The latter having been achieved, we also had a lot of fun joking with each other over the radio as we were collecting the samples. Weary but happy about our outing, we brushed off our dusty knees and returned to the Hab to a great meal prepared by Corentin. Quentin tried making bread, not quite up to his expectations…

After lunch, Jérémy started taking some time to speak individually with each of us, to check on how everyone is doing now that we have almost reached mid-rotation. Quentin also started implementing the location tracking system in the Hab to test it out before it is deployed in the entire station. In the end, there will be 10 integrated circuit boards we call “anchors” dispatched everywhere in the station, and each crew member will also wear one at all times (these we call “tags”). Every 10 seconds, the anchors and tags will “communicate” with each other and the distance between them will be saved to a database. This way, we will be able to know how much time crew members spend in different types of environments (bright or dark, noisy or calm, crowded or not, etc.) thanks to the environmental sensors. Of course, this data will be anonymized!

Coupled with the physiological and cognitive data we have been collecting, the researcher with whom we are working at the Swedish Royal Institute of Technology, will be able to analyze how the architecture and environment of the station has affected our work, our health and our mental state.

We are all looking forward to an evening full of laughs, and most importantly, a restful night.

Sol 12 – When stomachs are full, hearts are too

“Mars could do nothing to them, for they were bred to plains and prairies as open as the Martian fields. They came and made things a little less empty, so that others would find courage to follow.”

– Chapter 12 of The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury

“HabCom, for the record, I have never seen a smile so wide on Alexandre’s face!”

I was sorting the first photos of the day sitting at the Hab table, when I overheard the radio communication between Alice, our HabCom, and Quentin, out on EVA to deploy the weather station, MegaAres and LOAC once and for all (fingers crossed!). MegaAres is finally fully functional! Up until now, Mars had not brought us much luck: MegaAres had to be retrieved for repairs, we had to remove the LOAC because of the rain, and the weather station was knocked out by the wind. Today, all instruments are fully deployed and operational! Even the field mill, an instrument designed to measure the electric field around the weather station, which was left uninstalled because of cabling issues, is up and running. Alexandre was ecstatic, and did a little dance around the antenna at the end of the EVA.

After lunch, the food and water resupply ships landed not far from the station, and moving between the different modules of the station was temporarily suspended. Corentin and I, stuck in the Science Dome for a little while, talked about how difficult it is to continue communicating with our loved ones, our lives being for the most part disconnected from Earth.

As my heart rate was being monitored for 30 very long minutes for an experiment, and as I stood there doing nothing, I realized once again how deformed our perception of time can be. Mid-rotation is just around the corner, time has gone by much too quickly for my taste, and here I am, 5 minutes into my ECG, feeling like I have been standing there for hours…

Upon returning to the Hab, I was so relieved to see cupboards and cabinets full of food! Watching Alice and Jérémy play catch with cereal boxes was a very endearing sight.

I feel like everyone is feeling a bit weary tonight: Corentin and Jérémy are working on solving a data handling issue, while Alice is feverishly preparing the schedule for the next week, and Quentin is trying to implement a location tracking system, essential to our experiment in partnership with the Swedish Royal Institute of Technology. Nevertheless, we maintain our optimist outlook on the mission and are glad that all atmospheric experiments are finally deployed. Hopefully, Alexandre will have both more time and good weather in the next few weeks to focus on his astronomy project!

To inaugurate our new, freshly off-the counter freeze-dried food stock, Jérémy is preparing a lasagna feast for the whole crew!