Sol 9 – A Hollywoodian movie

Author: Nicolas Wattelle

We are now at a point where the end of our mission is as far as its beginning. It is a strange feeling; this is one of the first times where we concretely think about the “end” of our more than a one-year-long project. But be reassured, it does mean that we do not keep up the good work!

Valentine is a clever strategist. Our HSO, for Health and Security Officer, takes care of us every day with sports sessions, proposing sophrology exercises, keeping an eye on our personal physiological data… She is like the guardian angel of each of us here, and it is great to have her by our side. But this morning, she organised an exercise of rescuing an injured astronaut, but in order to provide great data to analyse, she developed a scenario, Hollywood-worthy.

All began during yesterday’s eve, where she separately took each member of the crew to explain their role in testing a rescue protocol. She told everyone, except Cerise and Léa, that Elena would simulate a fall and an injury, and everyone one would have to abide by the protocol. The aim was to measure different parameters such as efficiency, time to secure the victim, and physiological data from Martianauts living the situation in EVA.

But in reality, she told the true scenario to Léa (who had to stay in the Hab during the EVA) and Cerise (who was Mathéo’s buddy during the EVA): Valentine herself, was meant to simulate being the victim before Elena did. Like this, the situation was more likely unforeseen for most of us and would be more realistic, while keeping the situation under control if something went wrong. In this case, Léa would have been able to inform Marine (today’s Habcom) and same with Cerise and Mathéo. It was very clever.

Everything went as planned, and after the protocol was applied, Valentine revealed the truth to the Marine, Elena, and Matheo who couldn’t be sure of what had really happened (even if Elena seemed to have understood quickly…). And we are now waiting for the data to be processed. This was a very exciting morning, and we had a great time talking about it at lunch!

For the work that has been done inside the station today, we made our second session of ultrasound with the Sonoscanner device and CNES protocol. Since last week, we received some adjustments from researchers, and it was useful. I think everyone improved their “image capture skills”, finding on average one organ more than last time.

On this subject, Elena is really impressive for an engineering student, she made twice a perfect shot! She may begin a conversion… The whole crew seems to appreciate this experiment and is really involved in giving their feedback and feelings about the protocol. This is a pleasure working in these conditions!

Sol 7 – From Interstellar to gravitropism experiment

Author : Nicolas Wattelle

Rest has been great (we all appreciated Christopher Nolan’s movie), now it is time to go back to efficient work! And I think we did: our schedule was not really full so we took advantage of it to prepare the next days, and to do what we usually have not the time to. The upcoming days are very exciting, this is partly due to the weather improvement, so we can broaden our EVA plans and make the mission go forward.

During the day, our focus was thus on planning, data processing and maintenance. For the planning, discussions have taken place during the whole early afternoon on the upper deck, and one of the great news is concerning the geological field study (mainly for Marine and Léa who are in charge of it) that might begin no later than tomorrow. Cerise, our commander, make a great job everyday to handle the tricky moving planning, dealing with all constraints (even the last-minute ones), and she always tries to satisfy each of us’ interests. She is a great commander (honestly, without any will to become the favourite).

In the middle of all this, two remarkable novelties: Elena has started the preparation of a spirulina culture; and Mathéo tried for the first time to pilot the drone from inside the Hab during an EVA. Léa who was Habcom at this moment, found this very useful to be able to follow the astronauts this way, it is much easier to understand their progression with this point of view (can you spot the astronauts on the today’s drone shot?).

Also, maintenance has been performed on the Solar Musk cupola, on the field mill (we had a mishap with it during the last EVA) and on the gravitropism experiment.

But what is gravitropism? Plants grow, we already know that, but in fact, they grow in response to stimuli. The stimulus can be various things: light, water presence, heat, fertilizer… In these cases, we respectively speak about phototropism, hydrotropism, thermotropism and chemotropism. Each plant is sensitive to these phenomena, like in a competition between the latter, and each plant is more or less responsive to a phenomenon. We know since the XVIIIth century that plants react to gravity. Gravitropism (and so gravity) is one of the reasons why roots go down and rods go up.

During our mission, and in collaboration with middle and high school students, we try to observe and disturb gravitropism. How do we do this? Thanks to inertia! We grow plants (ones with rapid growth, like lentils, beans, wheat…), on a turning wheel (almost 30 cm of radius), in order to make seeds feel centrifugal force. This way, when you add the contribution of this force to gravitational force, you obtain an inclined resultant (the force is not purely vertical anymore). And we might be able to see modifications in the growth. This is the idea of an historic experiment named “Knight’s Wheel”.

We had some trouble doing this experiment during our first week, but today, we took this experiment back to zero, hoping it will show interesting things before next weekend. Plus, we plan to experiment another unperformed protocol during our last week: what if we turn the wheel vertical? We are very curious to produce data on it!

PS: In addition, you can find in the daily pictures the M81 galaxy 11,74 million of light years away, observed by Marine. A picture like this might leave us dreamers, imagining a solar system similar to ours, and who knows… An inhabited planet like ours?

Sol 6 – Rest Day, simple day

Today was our first rest day. In fact, almost. We did two short EVAs, one for changing batteries for our outdoor devices, and another one for Mathéo to do his first session with the HoloLens Augmented Reality Experiment.

Otherwise, we spent the day together in the Hab, cleaning our place, cooking, speaking about our lives, and watching movies. Mars is starting to feel like home. We loved this time, and I think these kinds of days will be crucial for future long-term space missions and also our analog one which is filled by activities and experiments: breaks are essential. This first week has been really intense, and everyone here needs this time of rest, with simple things. Have the time to take a step back, to appreciate together, to think… And have a clear mind to begin the upcoming week!

And more, even if I have not spoken much of it the last few days, each time we spend “everyday life moments” together, each Crew member has the same unity feeling. Particularly when we sit all around a table to have lunch, to have a coffee, when we discuss on the sofa… I think our crew is deeply united, benevolent to the others, and this mission might create an indestructible link between us, because of our common work and because here we represent the daily human contact to each other, almost like a family. These moments have thus entirely their part of importance in a crewed mission.

For now, I will end this report here, because my crew mates are waiting for me to begin the movie Interstellar, and I do not want to miss living this moment! See you tomorrow!

Sol 5 – Allo… do you copy?

Author: Nicolas WATTELLE

Today we missed a rendezvous. In the context of the HF propagation study, we were supposed to contact a different “Martian base” in Toulouse. There, the radio club REF 31 should have gathered ham radios and pointed its antenna towards the MDRS.

Remember, on Sol 3 we set up the antenna near the Hab. During the following day, we set up the indoor setup: an ICOM transceiver, an antenna adapter, and a computer, linked to our triangle of steel. We did some tests, we received signals from around the planet, so we were hopeful for this morning’s session. But our experiment does not depend only on our work, another big factor named “The Sun” has also its part of the responsibility.

Mars (as Earth), has an atmosphere made of different layers. Among them, one, in particular, allows long-range propagation: the ionosphere. This layer is sensitive to Sun activity (solar storms, eruptions…), and can accumulate electrical charges. And if the total charge is significant, it permits HF waves reflections, and considerably increases the range of radiocommunications.

On Earth you might be able to perform intercontinental contacts, only using basic antennas and transceivers: a ground-ground communication without any satellite or other facility between the source and the receiver. It would be an interesting technique to use between ground stations on Mars!

So, we tried during the last months to set this experiment with the radio club (we will also perform beacon listening during the upcoming days to characterize the propagation following the propagation during the days), and today was the first attempt.

The protocol was one hour long, testing different modes of modulation, from the more reliable to the less reliable one. But the Sun might not have had enough activity the previous days: we faced a sad silence. We issued calls, but we received no answer. Have we been heard in France? We don’t know yet. But we will twice again before our mission ends, another case to follow!

That was the first experiment of the day for Valentine and me. For the rest of the crew the day was more classic: a maintenance EVA for the atmospheric experiment, adjusting the planning for the next week, repairs in the RAM…

For this one, I would like to thank a lot our Crew Engineer Matheo, who made a great job with the MegaAres antenna, tinkering with what we had in the RAM: it was out of service since the beginning of our mission, and we will be able to put it on the field by tomorrow! Thank you again Matheo (take a look at him and me, striking a pose in front of the “brand new” antenna!).

All the crew is now looking forward to tomorrow, our first “Martian rest day”! We can’t wait!

Sol 4 – Experiments filled day

Author : Nicolas WATTELLE

To be honest, today I felt a bit tired. The accumulation of the previous days and the double EVAs of the morning might be responsible for that.

First, two EVAs were planned during the day. One during the morning, one for the afternoon. But because of the snow melting, we had to condense the two outings in half a day: the first team was made by Matheo, Elena, Valentine and I. For the second, we just went out with Matheo. We tried for the first time, Matheo’s Search and Rescue protocol with drones. For him it was a bit stressful, because he was worrying for the possible unforeseen of piloting a drone in simulation conditions. While for Elena and I it was way more relaxing: we just had to walk in a predefined zone, and… “get lost”. The trial went well, Valentine and Matheo geotagged us very quickly, and we left the zone with some ideas to improve the protocol; it is promising.

In the afternoon, we were mostly all out the hab. Some of us were working on repairing the MegaAres antenna. It is interesting to tinker in a constrained area, with limited resources: “do what you can with what you have” is a sentence that seems like a chorus for Mathéo and I. Until now, we always managed to go further in this tricky repair, let’s hope it lasts! Valentine, Marine and Lea performed sessions of some of our human factor experiments: Teleop and other tests grouped in a software called “TAP”. TAP is definitively our daily nightmare. Briefly, imagine that you have to stay in front of your computer during an hour and a half, answering questions and doing cognitive exercises during which you test your focus in various ways. Sometimes you need to find correlations between shapes, colours, sounds… and “tap” on the right button as soon as you can. The first time it felt like challenging, almost like a game, but once you have done it several times it becomes really boring… But we are dedicated to our mission and we believe these data can help researchers. At the end of the day, it remains a subject that makes us laugh during meals so fair enough!

Today, in my tired person thoughts, I asked my teammates: How do you imagine the first crew walking on Mars?

That started a debate, even if everyone agreed on most subjects. Léa talked about the importance to send experts in widely various domains: engineering, medicine, geology… Marine and others hope that women and men would be equally represented, and more generally that it would be a fair selection. One question that was raised, is the one of the nationalities of the crew members. Does a country will succeed doing it alone, or would it be an international collaboration? Here at the MDRS, some are really convinced, and some are not. Only the future will tell us!

Sol 3 – Botanic emergency

Author : Nicolas WATTELLE

Definitely, a day without any complication on Mars, that may not exist…

Nevertheless, the day began quite well, I would even say that it was a very efficient work morning. One of the biggest challenges was setting up the antenna which we could not set the day before… The four martionauts chosen to do so were Valentine (she was wearing the Hololens during the whole outing today), Marine, Cerise and Léa. And, even if the task was not easy on paper, they appeared to manage very well: only one hour of the EVA was dedicated to achieve the tricky task.

This antenna is made of two big triangles (6 meters high), one in front of the other, directed towards France. It is called a Delta Loop, and ours was generously built by the radio club of Toulouse (REF 31), we were thus proud to see it set up in front of the Hab. We tested it, and the performances were encouraging, so that is good news for the future of our mission! A huge shout out to the four girls who made a perfect shot in EVA!

And then, the first unforeseen happened. Léa lost contact with her buddy beginning the last part of the EVA: her radio earphone and microphone had been unplugged while she was moving. So, writing on a paper to the three others, they decided to come back in the airlock, and the EVA was shortened. But this was nothing compared to what happened in the early afternoon…

We received a call from mission control. They discovered during the day that our GreenHab was compromised: white flies had contaminated the whole room so the future of all crops was at risk. The given instructions were clear: each Crew Member had to stop their activity and go to the GreenHab for a “big and fast gardening session”. We had to remove all the plants that were contaminated and assess the state of what can be salvaged and what was not.

First, we were worried for our disturbed schedule, but it turned out to be a great moment where we all had to work at the same place, at the same time. On top of this, the GreenHab atmosphere is always warm and really bright. Let’s say it, it was a pleasure doing it. But the result was quite sad: only few crops could had been saved, the GreenHab will not be usable for the next days. Currently, we do not know if we will be able to see fresh plants growing before the mission ends. The only kind we kept in our responsibility is the gravistropism experiment, which we are doing with school students back in France, which we moved to the ScienceDome.

At the end of the day, Elena the GreenHab officer had to write her last GreenHab report, and she will say goodbye to this special part of the station, that she had taken care of for the past four days…

Finally, we came back to our activities left uncompleted. And by the time I am writing these words, almost all the crew is helping to find ideas on how to cook the (big) harvest of the day: our lasts fresh vegetables of the mission.

Sol 2 – A day on Mars’ North pole

Author: Nicolas Wattelle

Today was supposed to be a very busy day, and even if it didn’t go as planned, I will be happy to sleep well tonight.

The EVA program was completely full for the whole morning. Changing batteries for the field mill, putting back the LOAC that we took out yesterday (because it cannot stand too wet weather conditions…), installing the antenna for the HF waves propagation study, first look at Candor Chiasma in order to find a great spot to begin the geological experiment (and use LIBS for the first time!).

But it felt like we moved to Mars’ north pole during the night: when we woke up, there was snow everywhere, about 4cm around the MDRS. At first sight, this was really beautiful to see, but we changed our minds when we understood it was compromising our plans… Doing an EVA as long as we had planned would have been risky, so it was decided that the EVA would just aim to change the battery of the field mill (this was the only thing necessary, waiting another day to change the battery would have put at risk its lifetime…).

Also, the snow completely covered our solar panels. Usually, these work in pair with a generator, and they provide enough energy to endure a day at the MDRS, with a crew living and working. So, we had to cut our electrical consumption for the day, keeping only essential devices plugged. This explains the pictures of preparing for the EVA, only using the light coming through the narrow windows to see.

I think this is what trying to live on Mars would look like, everyone will have to get out of their comfort zone, living day to day with the recurrent hazards… But Crew 263 is here to live this experiment, so we accept our fate and hope for better days!

During the afternoon, we were almost all together in the upper deck of the Hab. We made rotations around different experiments, in which sometimes we are operators and sometimes, subjects. On my side, I was mainly focused on producing the first podcast episode, for curious students (and all other curious!) we collaborate with. We hope people on Earth are interested in our mission.

We tried for the first time the ultrasound experiment using a CNES protocol and a Sonoscanner device. It was really interesting, the method is very smart: with one hand, we handle the ultrasound probe, on the other a smartphone with Augmented Reality software. It shows where to place the probe and is thus like a game: we have to put 4 spheres in 4 cubes, and when it is done, we record the sequence. None of us are doctors, but thanks to this protocol we can manage to get great pictures of our organs! We are really grateful to CNES for letting us participate in the conception of this futuristic device!

On another topic, I have to confess something. We are not only 7 in this station… Since we have arrived, someone is there in the Hab upper deck, looking at us all day. He proudly stands at the window. His name is Tomarsto, and he is always there, during great moments and hard times. We hope he will stay there until the end of the simulation, and even more! Take a look at him in the picture of the day!

Sol 1 – Searching for a routine, or almost…

Author: Nicolas Wattelle

Yesterday was the day of the firsts, now we need to move on, to evolve, to become real analog martionauts. Although we have not discovered everything yet, things are becoming familiar to us.

We all woke up at 6:45am, in order to be ready for the sport session at 7 am. Our first one together! Valentine had prepared a cardio training, which felt a bit rough to all of us, but we will say that it is normal for a first session (Crew 240 reported similar feelings in Pierre’s -the journalist- report a month ago…).

Anyway, this was a good cohesion moment, a great way to begin the day!

Then, the breakfast was in some sort similar to the previous day, carefully prepared by two members of the crew. It was a hearty meal for the four-brand new martionauts who had to prepare for the challenge of the day: the first crew EVA.

This one had multiples objectives: first, to get used to the suits, the communication protocol, the crew member buddy system… It may seem like it is obviously easy but, be aware that this is not the case, even for people who mentally prepared for a year. Second, to check the status of the atmospheric experiment left on the field by Crew 240: the weather station, the LOAC (an amazing aerosol meter), the electric field mill… There, we had some surprises, and we could not do all of what was planned for this phase of today’s EVA. However, we will put things back in order in the coming days. Last, to do a first on-field trial of the Hololens. I was chosen to wear the glasses (during all the outing) for Augmented Reality (AR) testing. But it did not go well. The glasses fell slowly during the EVA, so much that when this phase began, I was almost half blind… I had to let them completely fall around my neck to get my vision back and we shortened the EVA. Note for the future tests: prepare a better mounting to keep the glasses on. A case to follow!

Lunches are always discussion moments. We speak about a lot of things, such as our “old” terrestrial life or our new Martian life. But lately, the food rationing topic came back frequently: we have three weeks’ worth of food already in the station but how do we manage to correctly feed everyone without being too drastic or too neglecting? On top of that, how to make it taste good every day? Some of us are more likely to be cook than others (guess what, that would not be me…), so they lead the discussion about this puzzle (and I thank them a lot!).

The afternoon was quite similar to the previous one. Everyone was focused on personal experiments in different rooms of the station: ScienceDome, GreenHab, upper and lower deck of the Hab… And it went well!

As the crew journalist, I would like you, dear reader, to come to the backstage of the mission with me, and discover more about my mates I am living this journey with. To give you this glimpse, some days, I may ask some of them what are their thoughts about different subjects. My question of the day is:

Why are you here?

Mathéo did not hesitate for a second, he clearly wants to make a first step into astronauts’ life. He took this MDRS mission as an opportunity to get closer to his dream.

To Marine, research is part of her life, and she aims to make a living out of it. This project is a concrete and original way to get a first step into research, so she has get involved in it!

Léa also has a particularly clear idea of her motivations. The operational aspect of crewed flights is what she is keen on, and analogs are an efficient way to understand the full scope of it!

Elena wants to work in human spaceflight, and in order to be a good an engineer and designer, one must think as an astronaut, and she is taking this mission as an opportunity to walk in astronauts shoes!

Sol 0 – The day of the firsts

Author: Nicolas Wattelle

Good evening everyone. I am Nicolas, and I will the journalist for Crew 263, performing a 3 weeks analog mission in the Mars Desert Research Station, that has just started.

This day was the day of the firsts. First breakfast, first reports, first dehydrated food, first everything on Mars.

This morning, we finished our MDRS training with our instructor, focused on EVAs and the principles of sim. On the menu: allocation of our spacesuits, presentation of surrounding terrain maps, test of the rovers. This was very exciting, mainly regarding the potential of our outdoor experiments incoming (especially Marine and Lea for their geological field study, and Matheo for the Astronaut Search and Rescue experiment).

Then, the sim concretely began. We wanted to make this moment memorable, so we took the traditional group picture in front of the Hab before closing the airlock, marking symbolically the beginning of the simulation. At this point, we deeply discussed about our personal expectations for this mission, and wishing each other, three amazing weeks of collaborative work.

Then, all the firsts took places.

The first experiments. This was spirited : after working a whole year preparing them, we are now able to perform them! Marine took charge of the Solar Musk telescope, Cerise began her water quality evaluation, Mathéo and I prepared the gravistropism experiment in the GreenHab… Elena literally sent us in the future of space exploration, we served as subjects for her Hololens experiment: an aid for astronaut using Augmented Reality (in fact, these are large glasses projecting information over our own view, and with useful functionalities to help our experiments…). Personally, I was impressed, and I am looking forward to test it during EVAs!

The first meals. We discovered dehydrated food. Against all odds, it was really good, we were ready for much worse! We will see how it evolves through the days, I don’t want to talk too fast… And, regarding food, as proud French people, Léa and Matheo made the first loaf of bread. While I’m writing these words, we didn’t taste it yet, but it will surely be amazing! I will keep you in the loop…

The first reports. You are currently reading one of them, and I hope you are appreciating it. It is a bit stressful and we feel sometimes lost writing our words, but we will get the hang of it!

P.S: One remarkable point of this first day is the weather. This morning, the wind blew so fast that we really struggled taking our crew picture in front of the Hab. Keeping our eyes opened was a painful challenge (you may notice it one the one linked to this report, it was picked out of 20 others pictures!).

Sol 18: The conclusion – Going back to Earth

Author : Pierre Fabre

Hi everyone! This is our last report on Mars. (It won’t be the longest report I’ve made because it has been a very busy day and we are currently enjoying the best burger ever with Atila).

Let me talk to you a bit about what happened during this last Sol on Mars.

This day was the day of the lasts. Last workout, last breakfast, last EVA, last lunch, last rehydrated food, last everything on Mars.

At 3:00 PM, the same hour at which we started the simulation 3 weeks ago, we didn’t put our spacesuits on, we stepped into the front airlock, we didn’t wait 5 minutes for depressurisation, we opened the door, and just as during our first EVA, the light came into the airlock and blinded us for a moment, but this time it was the light of our dear planet Earth. It was a really weird sensation to leave the station by the same door we passed through so many times wearing our spacesuits for EVAs. This time we could feel the fresh air on our skin, hear the noises around us, talk without pressing the button of our walkie-talkie, breathing fresh air that hadn’t passed through our ventilation system, touch things with our hands and feel the contact on our skin. We took the same pictures we took on our Sol 0 before starting the sim. I think we look pretty much the same. Maybe on today’s picture we look a bit more tired, dirtier and more in shape (thanks to Julie’s workouts). You can still see in our eyes that we feel excited but it has nothing to do with the excitation we felt before starting the sim. On the Sol 0 it was the excitation of going on Mars and performing incredible experiments during 3 weeks. Today we were excited to contact our families and our friends, to see what happened on Earth during the mission, to see the reactions of people on Earth to our mission and last but not least we were excited because of the double bacon cheeseburger we are going to eat for dinner with Atila.

To conclude this last report, I am going to let my crew mates tell their favorite moment of the mission

"Julie: The games at night were a great moment to share with my crewmates. It’s the only moments when you have the right to not be serious, to not think about your work, to laugh, to get to know your partners better. These moments partly made us a real team and above all real friends.

Marion: I really enjoyed the EVAs, those were the moments where I really felt on Mars. I had never seen scenery like this, one moment you’re on Mars, the next you’re on the Moon. The views are breath-taking, every time we stopped at a viewpoint, I tried to print an image of the view in my brain to never forget it.

Maxime: The EVAs shared with my crewmates were definitely my favorite moments, we really felt we were on Mars. Each EVA was unique for me and seeing this amazing red landscape gave me incredible sensations.

Clément: There are many, but a big one was walking back into Candor Chasma for the first time since my first mission. I think it brought back a whole lot of memories from the first time I went there, and it reminded me of how awesome it was to be there at MDRS again!

François: My favorite moment was certainly the end of the day, when all crew members just sat and talked about their day, after all the work done. We could finally rest a little bit and enjoy talking and joking with each other.

For my part, it has been a pleasure to write those daily reports during those 3 weeks and I hope you enjoyed them. Don’t forget, there will be a bonus episode of "Interview with" when we will be back on Earth with Raphael, our Botanist who couldn’t make it to Mars with us.