14 DAY TRIAL // Six “astronauts” have just finished exploring the Red Planet as part of the Mars500 experiment, and they are currently getting ready to begin their voyage back home. They are scheduled to reach Earth sometime in November 2011.
The crew members maneuvered their dummy spacecraft out of Martian orbit yesterday, March 2, and began a months-long journey back home. Their mission simulator is located on the outskirts of the Russian capital Moscow.
The China National Space Administration (CNSA), the Russian Federal Space Agency (RosCosmos) and the European Space Agency (ESA) are collaborating on this 520-day experiment.
Its purpose is to simulate the effects that long-duration space journeys would have on the moral of astronauts heading for the Red Planet. Human limitations are currently among the chief obstacles preventing us from exploring our neighboring planet.
Scientists want to see how six individuals could stand living in isolation with only each other's company for at least 18 months. Undoubtedly, the pressure on a real crew would be a lot larger, but Mars500 is a good place to start in investigating human behavior in space.
“T-249 days to the end of 520-day experiment. TODAY: hatch closure, Mars Lander undocking. See you later Mars!” twitted Mars500 project managers yesterday, Space reports.
The six astronauts are locked inside a series of sealed containers replicating the inside of a spaceship. The spacecraft is located at the Institute of Biomedical Problems (IBMP), in Moscow.
Mars500's crew is made up of three Russian cosmonauts, two European astronauts, and a Chinese participant. All of them need to get along for just as much time as it would take to travel to Mars and back in real life.
“I think that even if it wasn't exactly the same emotion someone would feel on Mars, it did come quite close, at least for me,” Mars500 astronaut Diego Urbina (ESA) said in a recent blog post.
He made the announcement after a series of simulated spacewalks that the crew carried out inside a sealed container imitating the Martian surface. Three astronauts descended to the surface, collected samples, and practiced various safety and exploration protocols.
“The crew is highly motivated and performing very well. At this point, everything looks very good,” said in a recent statement Jennifer Ngo-Anh, who is the manager of Mars500 at ESA.