Month: January 2020

Journalist Report

Hannah Blackburn, Crew 219 Lead Science Officer

Sol 1

Return to the Red Planet

The Martian landscape is cold, dusty, and rusty red. My new home is the polar opposite of the tropical and lushly vegetated campus of Florida Tech, and yet I feel just as at home. Waking up in my cozy bunk felt like I never left Mars at all. I almost expected to sit down for breakfast with the other members of Crew 205, but it has been a year since we were the only known inhabitants of the red planet. Now, my crew is number 219, and we have our own adventure to begin.

I am the Lead Science Officer of Crew 219, so my main responsibility is to help my crewmates with their research. Today we went on two EVAs to collect regolith samples for our biological remediation experiment. All eight of us now have boot prints on the surface of Mars, at least until the next dust storm wipes them away. So far the weather has been acceptable for EVAs, but the sky has not been clear enough to take astronomy data. We are all looking forward to seeing the stars above the Martian mountains.

As I am writing this, I am enjoying the sights and smells of the GreenHab. We picked some sage for dinner, and the scent alone is making me hungry. I can’t wait to share a pot of soup with my crew and relax together after our day of hard work. Maybe we’ll watch a movie to celebrate our first sol on the red planet. It’s a little on the nose, but I’m thinking The Martian.

Journalist Report

Robinson Raphael, Crew 219 Astronomer,

Sol 0,

The Beginning of New Potentials

Crew 219 has officially arrived on Mars! Upon arriving, we
familiarized ourselves with Crew 218 and overall had a joyous and
welcoming experience. Alongside me, the crew geologist, commander,
HSO, LSO all slept in the science dome. It was quite frightful to wake
up this morning as I was the only person in the science dome. At
first, I was so confused questioning. Did my crew leave me? Did I
oversleep?? Was I still in a dream??? After giving myself some time, I
arrived back at the Hab to see a long line to use the bathroom. Some
things never change….. I slowly found out that each crew member woke
up at different times and just left. Keith, our HSO, journeyed to the
GreenHab at 2am only to find out the heater stopped. Oh boy that story
made all of us laugh and was a wonderful way to the start the day. As
the morning progressed, we all said our goodbyes to Crew 218 and
wished them a safe journey back to Earth.

As each member of Crew 218 left, we were filled with sadness as their
company was well appreciated. At the same time, we were also filled
with motivation, as we reminisced on the research projects they were
working on. A little bit after, we all took a written quiz which both
filled our guts with anticipation and a bit of nervousness. One by one
we all handed our quizzes back to be graded and slowly waited for
results. After each quiz was graded, we let out a burst of excitement
to find out that the crew passed and was able to carry on with their
day.

The day was quite adventurous as it consisted of training with the
rovers and learning how to put on the flight suits. For the rover
training, I was paired with Alejandro and we drove all to the starting
point of Galileo Road. Man, oh man it was so cold; my face felt like a
brick. Definitely going to bring more layers next time! The scenery of
Mars was gorgeous and breathtaking that I couldn’t just help but stare
all around me. As Alejandro was driving for the first half of the
journey, we kept singing to help the time go by and it was a wonderful
moment. When it came to the flight suits, we all took pictures posing
for the camera and admiring the feel and look.

As the day began to grow darker, the whole Crew 219 spent a majority
of time doing their own thing and helping out with daily tasks such as
washing dishes, cleaning the rooms, cooking, etc. I can’t wait to wake
up to our first Sol on Mars tomorrow morning!

Journalist Report

Ben Durkee, Crew 218 Journalist

Sol 13

This morning started off soothing and somber. We crawled out of our sleeping bags to the gentle ukelele of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” Depleting our remaining hot chocolate supply, we watched the sun scale the hill east of the Hab. Without sharing any words, we lamented this being our last Martian sunrise together. Once we had fully woken up and sufficiently mellowed out, there was an immediate paradigm shift and we launched straight into our jam-packed itinerary.

First on the docket: Hab cleaning. Since we had done most of the cleaning yesterday, we knew exactly what still needed to be done and we each splintered off to tackle a different task. I took mop duty. Our pipes still hadn’t thawed, so mopping became a struggle between refreshing the water as little as possible without slathering the floor with a muddy sludge. I spent a period in a seemingly unending sine wave between cleaning a region and then painting it brown, back and forth ad infinitum. Eventually, we sent Jonathan outside with pots of hot water to pour on the pipes in an attempt to thaw them. In light of this effort and the many gallons of water we had remaining from the mission, we considered water conservation a bit less of a concern. As a result, we got our Martian housekeeping done just in time for our guests to arrive.

Our metaphorical doorbell (the Habitat radio) rang and we invited Crew 219 through the airlock. They are a squad assembled of Florida Tech students and alumni, 8 people strong. Considering there are only 6 state rooms and 1 loft, it’s going to be a bit of a cozy Hab. I get the impression they’ll handle it well, though. They seem like a very tight-knit group and more than ready to face this mission together. I have only good things to say about these guys and training them today has been an absolute pleasure.

It’s weird to be the jaded survivors tasked with passing down knowledge to our starry-eyed successors. I’m almost jealous they now get to live this incredible experience that we’ve just concluded. It’s like when you finish a great book or television show and wish you could just erase your memory of it and live it again. But we’ve had our fun and the time has come to pass the torch and hand these folks the keys to a shiny new Mars Habitat.

Tonight is going to be a bittersweet night, full of reminiscing about our time on the red planet and breaking bread with our new Floridian friends. All in all, this has been an unbelievably enriching experience.

Were we packed into tiny, overheated sleeping quarters like a can of sardines in an oven? Yes. Did I have to painstakingly scrape beans from all the dishes with my fingernails and a bean juice-soaked sponge? I’ll never be able to forget. Was I forced to put up with these 5 lovable scamps for two whole weeks? Yep. Would I do it again?

In a heartbeat.