EVEN astronauts sometimes pretend they are in space. Over the past week, two simulated trips came to a close. One took place on a Hawaiian volcano, while another dove deep to an underwater habitat off Florida鈥檚 coast. In both cases, the crew was tasked with a vital mission: to learn more about themselves. But there鈥檚 more to it than that.
Why pretend to go to space?
Mock flights allow us to explore what an extended trip to Mars or beyond might look like. The duration of the flight and the crushing isolation will challenge astronauts in many ways. Studies of missions on the International Space Station suggest that depression and anxiety are most likely to hit during the 鈥渢hird quarter鈥� of a six-month mission, but it is unclear what this phenomenon might mean for longer trips. A trip to Mars would take about 18 months. In addition, living in such a small space with other crew members could cause and aggravate conflicts. These problems would complicate a real-life mission, so it makes sense to work them out on the ground first.
鈥淲e really need to know how to keep crew healthy and happy on these long space missions,鈥� says of the University of Hawaii at Manoa.
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What does a simulation look like?
The Hawaii Space Exploration Analog and Simulation (HI-SEAS) takes place inside a dome on Mauna Loa volcano, which is supposed to mimic conditions on Mars. Its second experiment, which took 120 days and involved a crew of six, wrapped up on Friday.
Meanwhile, the NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations (NEEMO) project sends aquanauts to live in an underwater laboratory alongside coral reefs in the Atlantic Ocean. Underwater, movement is slower and air is scarce, just as it would be on another planet. The current crew, the eighteenth, were down for nine days, emerging on Tuesday.
鈥淪imulations can be useful, but fidelity to the actual conditions being simulated is always the primary issue,鈥� says Jack Stuster, a psychologist at Anacapa Sciences in Santa Barbara, California. In NEEMO and HI-SEAS, extra elements are thrown in to make the expedition more space-like. Like real astronauts, the crew鈥檚 days are tightly scheduled with tasks, including regular 鈥渟pacewalks鈥� to explore the area and test equipment. Communication to the outside world is also artificially delayed; for example, emails from HI-SEAS take an extra 20 minutes to send, the time they would take to travel from Mars to Earth.
What about their mental state?
Participants were asked to fill out surveys about their feelings every day, sometimes several times a day. But what these tests can tell us is limited. Survey-takers might paint a rosier picture of how the mission is going, or perhaps not even realise how much they are struggling. 鈥淎stronauts are very positive people,鈥� says Binsted. 鈥淚t鈥檚 important to us to be able to detect problems as they鈥檙e arising before they get to the critical stage.鈥�
So researchers turn to more indirect measures of how the crew is faring. At both stations, participants played group computer games to assess how well they worked together. Everyone at HI-SEAS wore badges that tracked where they went and the surrounding noise level, to show if certain people were avoiding each other or getting into arguments. Aquanauts at NEEMO were videoed as they went about their day, so observers could later assess teamwork and communication styles. Saliva was also collected to test stress levels.
What do the participants say about it?
鈥淎s far as the isolation is concerned, it probably started to bother me more and more towards the end of the mission,鈥� says Ross Lockwood, who took part in the HI-SEAS experiment. Fellow crew member Lucie Poulet says she began to feel 鈥渁 little abandoned by the outside world鈥� by the end.
聯The isolation started to bother me more and more towards the end of the mission聰
Mark Vande Hei, who dove down with NEEMO, got a better sense of astronauts鈥� daily grind. He鈥檒l take the experience back with him above water, where he often interacts with working astronauts at a job at NASA鈥檚 Mission Control Center in Houston, Texas. 鈥淚n the future, I鈥檒l have a better feel of what type of stresses they鈥檙e under,鈥� he says.
This article appeared in print under the headline 鈥淲hen space crews play make believe鈥�
