EVA #10 Report
Today’s EVA began at 10:00 AM, involving Camila, Julio, and I. The Survivalman crew was filming our EVA, including the planning process, communications tests, putting on the spacesuits, and our decompression. The goal of our EVA was to go to Lith Canyon, collect three regolith samples, and return to the Hab. Each of the EVA crew boarded an ATV, with Les Stroud on his own ATV, and his camera crew on Deimos. I had Camila lead the way out so we could keep our ATV caravan nice and tight. The trip there took about an hour, because they needed footage of us along several different stretches of Cow Dung Rd. We would hold our position as they moved ahead, then we would move forward once they signaled that they were ready.
Once we arrived at the end of the Lith Canyon road, we proceeded on foot for about a kilometer westward. We had to be careful with our route finding as this was an area that none of us had been to before. We made sure to photograph the landscape at certain points so it would be easier to find our location later. Once we descended into the canyon, we made our way to an exposure with red and white regolith layers, taking one sample from each type. Once finished we walked further down the canyon where there were several eolian rock formations. There we collected our last regolith sample from a white exposure, turned around, and headed back the way we came. We spent about 2 hours walking in the Lith Canyon area, returning to the ATVs by around 1:20 PM. They didn’t need any more footage for the trip back, so we made our way back to the Hab by around 1:50 PM.
Today’s EVA was abnormally warm, especially all the walking we had to do. This was the longest EVA that I’ve had to do on foot, and was very challenging. I’d estimate that we walked a total of about 2 km over uneven terrain. It’s amazing how heavy and uncomfortable the suits felt on the first EVA when we just walked around the Hab. Now I feel a lot better in the EVA suit, even when covering much longer distances. Knowing this, I’m glad we didn’t plan any really long EVAs during our first few days of Sim, as it does take some time to get used to those suits. I’d definitely recommend that crew members take their time getting used to the suits, as their bulkiness can be surprising.
For our EVA, we managed to obtain the regolith samples we needed and the Survivorman crew was able to record our EVA operations.
This is all I have to report for today’s EVA.
Have a great night Mission Support!
Prepared by Brandon Ferguson
EVA Officer