Today was an exciting day for the ILMAH crew. Despite weather issues (high winds), the crew were able to complete one EVA successfully. Important progress was made with the plant experiments as well. The big difference today was the implementation of communication delays to simulate a real Mars mission experience. Even a small delay makes a big difference in communication!
The crew is also gearing up for an exciting opportunity on MD9 (Friday, October 8th at 10 pm Central). They will be doing a live mission to mission communication event with the current MDRS analog crew via facebook messenger. You can watch live with this link:
Mission Commander Bill O’Hara:
Mission Day 8 began with high winds, threatening to upset our plans for a double-header EVA day. Diallo and I were scheduled for the morning and Rose and Terry were scheduled for the afternoon. Fortunately the winds died down enough for Diallo and I go on our third EVA of the mission. Unfortunately, by the time the afternoon came the winds were too high and we had to reschedule Rose and Terry’s EVA for tomorrow. Despite being a windy morning, Diallo and I completed the drone flying exercise without incident.
On other fronts, our mission science lead, Terry, made great strides in extracting and preserving the spirulina he grew. He will present a summary of his work in this area at the upcoming Mars Society convention!
This afternoon we switched comm with MCC to emulate the 20 minute round trip communication delay with Mars. During this period we tested out a text-based application that is being developed by a graduate student.
Mission Day 8 ended with continued planning of our Mars Habitat to Mars Habitat video conference with the Mars Society’s MDRS planned for 10pm CT on Mission Day 9. Those plans will be finalized early tomorrow. Hope you all are able to join the event! Stay tuned for a link!
That is all for today! Hoping for another EVA tomorrow if the weather cooperates! From the surface of Mars - Have a great night!
Crew Engineer Diallo Wallace:
Arose sharply at 06:00 without alarm. Reminded myself where I was and what we are accomplishing. Performed the emotion recognitions study and found a slight entertainment that new faces were included in today’s round of people that I have begun to give names to. This was our third day of no prep food (Dehydrated), so breakfast was oatmeal with cinnamon and a few pieces of dried fruit. We had to shift to the left in the mission timeline to accommodate stop times to meet other research initiatives and task. I had a rougher night’s sleep than previous nights, due to lower temperature changes occurring. The larger EEG was utilized, and the comfort is a world of difference. Notice the contacts on the skull without feeling like extreme pressure points as the previous cap made me feel. Maneuvering into the suit is faster now and I seem to have developed a reliable system to enter with minor assistance. Snap on a waist pack, add battery, and ascend the ladder to enter the suit seems to be sequence of events that has the least potential for problems. Previous attempt of entering the suit first and placing waist pack and battery on after entering caused several complications. The primary goal with this EVA is collecting more brainwave data for the PI. Secondary objectives are to test wireless headset for external communications and the collection of suit temperature and carbon dioxide values. Egressed the EVA module and previously decided no need for the wagon, so it made walking the stairs easier not having to coordinate with EVA1 on extracting the additional hardware. On the way to site, noticed the considerable uptick in wind velocity from previous days efforts. The newly planted large flag for APU was stretched to about 2/3 of it its total length making the velocity roughly 15-17knots. The direction had also shifted significantly indicating that the front that we have been monitoring finally has passed through. Made mental note to increase buffers for point-to-point translations and stopping times while flying. Had to perform more deliberate flying due to winds and fly at lower altitudes for wind compensation. A couple laps around the circuit and primary mission achieved. Performed best landing yet, even with higher than previous wind conditions. Once EVA1 was complete with his run trials priority was RTB. Doffing the suit seemed easier this go around as well, but my real excitement was getting to the data I collected that needed to be downloaded. There was a lot of activity, and my plan was after getting food would take 10 minutes to gather myself and decompress reading CONTACT. Sagan really knew how to write.
