If someday humans end up living on Mars, we must be prepared for the harsh conditions that await us there. The mission, called AMADEE-20 , organized by D-MARS, and led by the Austrian Space Forum in collaboration with the Israel Space Agency, will last three weeks and will take place in the Negev desert.
According to the chief of mission control, Reinhard Tlustos, the desert conditions are very similar to those on Mars, making it the ideal place to practice : “It is very dry, there is nothing to grow there, it is isolated and Mars is basically a big desert too. “
Several weeks pretending to be on Mars
While the crew, equipment and accommodation are located in Israel, mission control will be exercised from the premises of the Austrian Space Forum in Innsbruck.
It will be 5 men and a woman who will spend four weeks living in an analog installation of Mars on Earth. This is the thirteenth ‘Analog Astronaut’ mission led by the Austrian Space Forum, a network of aerospace engineers and space enthusiasts geared towards preparations for a future manned mission to Mars.
The mission began on October 11 and will end on October 31. During that time, all communication will be delayed to “simulate the propagation time of the signal between Earth and Mars,” explained OeWF director Gernot Grömer.
The team of analog astronauts, which is made up of international volunteers from Austria, Germany, Israel, Spain, Portugal and the Netherlands, will wear an “elaborate spacesuit prototype” every time they leave the simulated space habitat.
The suit, which weighs 45 kg, was designed to prevent graceful movements and features medical telemetry, to be as faithful as possible to the spacesuits planned for Mars. Analog space explorers will be asked to look for weak spots in these suits to help improve the design of future missions.
Analog astronauts will test the MELT 3D printer and its ability to print aerospace-grade plastics as part of manned and robotic planetary missions.
It is the thirteenth mission of its kind managed by the Austrian Space Forum and is similar to missions run by other agencies, including NASA.
