Volunteers Spent A Year In Isolation In A Dome Near A Volcano In Hawaii

An experiment to simulate living conditions on Mars funded by NASA has come to an end in Hawaii.

Six people entered a dome near a barren volcano year agw, and the emerged last week from their year-long isolation.

During the experiment, the six, which included a pilot, an astrobiologist, a physicist, an architect, a journalist, and a soil scientist lived in the 36-by-20-foot dome. Their only contact with the outside world was via email, and those transmission were delayed by 20 minutes to simulate the time it would take for a message to travel between Earth and Mars. The crew could leave the dome, but only wearing heavy space suits.

Gizmodo reports that the HI-SEAS (Hawaii Space Exploration Analog and Simulation) was situated on the Mauna Loa volcano in Hawaii because it is the best representation of the Martian terrain. During their stay, they received food and supplies every four months, with water arriving every two months. They were subjected to such simulated emergencies as power outages to a forced evacuation to avoid a harsh radiation wave.

The mission that ended Monday is the third, and longest such simulation. NASA will now begin reviewing the data collected by all of the teams with a focus on the psychological effects on the crews. There are two more HI-SEAS missions planned, with the next one beginning in January of next year.

(Image from HI-SEAS Facebook page)

FMI: http://hi-seas.org/