In a livestreamed event, four volunteers emerged Saturday from the Mars-like, restricted environment in southeast Texas where they had been living and working for 378 days.
Crew commanders Kelly Haston, Anka Serariu, Ross Brockwell and Nathan Jones are out. Mars Dunes Alpha In Houston, applause broke out around 5 p.m. Live Stream The ejection event was filmed. The four were part of the Crew Health and Performance Exploration Analog (CHAPEA) mission, which was the first to enter the isolated 1,700-square-foot 3D-printed habitat on the grounds of NASA's Johnson Space Center on June 25, 2023.
The crew took part in “Mars walks” and supplemented their shelf-stable food supplies with vegetables grown in the environment, experiencing life with limited resources and simulating communication delays and isolation from Earth, NASA said.
The CHAPEA 1 mission was designed to simulate a manned Mars exploration mission that NASA is preparing, which no country has yet undertaken.
NASA Deputy Administrator Steve Corner and four others — NASA astronaut and deputy administrator for flight operations Kjell Lindgren, CHAPEA principal investigator Grace Douglas, chief science officer for the Human Health and Performance Office Judy Hayes, and director of engineering Julie Kramer White — also participated in the Mars simulation. experience.
Corner praised the four volunteers for their “dedication” and said the crew “were separated from their families, put on a carefully prescribed meal plan and underwent extensive observation.” Corner added that the crew “were conducting important scientific research, primarily nutrition-based, as a stamina test in preparation for human life on Mars.” Corner also thanked the multidisciplinary team that supported the crew.
“[The CHAPEA 1 mission] “This was the first of three NASA analog missions to simulate the Martian environment,” Corner said. “This crew helped us gain critical information as we prepare to return to the Moon and go to Mars.” (Related: China's lunar probe returns to Earth with world's first lunar rock samples from the 'dark side')
“It's really wonderful to be able to say 'hello' to everyone,” said an ecstatic Commander Haston.
Haston, an enrolled member of the Mohawk Nation, one of six Grand River tribes in Canada, and a biomedical research scientist, described the mission as “a unique experience that has had great challenges, joys, sorrows and a fair bit of hard work – but also a fair bit of fun.”
Brockwell, an aeronautical engineer from Virginia, thanked the organization for “this incredible opportunity” and the chance to put into practice “the idea that we should not use resources faster than we can replenish them, and we should not create waste faster than we can give it back.”
“The mission was over in the blink of an eye,” said Jones, a professor of emergency medicine at Illinois who served as medical director. “I'm grateful to the American people who kept alive the dream that humanity might be able to make the next giant leap beyond Earth.”
Ms. Serariu, a Romanian-born microbiologist and U.S. Navy officer, served as science officer. She said she was “amazed to be able to contribute to my most important goal: bringing life to Mars.”
Preparing for long-term human presence on the Moon through a series of lunar exploration missions. Artemis This portends a planned manned mission to Mars, and one of the goals of the Artemis missions is to be the first woman and person of color to land on the moon. according to To NASA.
The ultimate goal of manned Mars exploration has been said to be “the next giant leap.”
Corner said the completion of CHAPEA 1 marks an important step in the U.S.' plan to lead the expansion of global interest and capabilities in space exploration.
