Scientists exit Hawaii dome after yearlong Mars simulation

Mars is very inhospitable and to experience the merciless atmosphere of the Red planet six scientists ( three male and three female) have been living in complete isolation from the outside world on a Hawaii mountain since August a year ago.

The group lived in the dome on a Mauna Loa mountain in Hawaii and were only allowed to go outside if wearing spacesuits.

Cyprien Verseux, a crew member from France, said the simulation shows a mission to Mars can succeed.

As the six emerged Sunday, on an overcast day, Verseux could be heard saying, “We were hoping for some sun”.

“The UH research going on up here is just super vital when it comes to picking crews, figuring out how people are going to actually work on different kinds of missions, and sort of the human factors element of space travel, colonization, whatever it is you are actually looking at”, Bassingthwaighte said.

Part of a long-term goal to send humans to Mars, the Hawaii Space Exploration Analog and Simulation (HI-SEAS) experiment was created to explore whether a crew could live together in close quarters over an extended period of time and under adverse conditions.

“HI-SEAS is an example of global collaborative research hosted and run by the University of Hawai’i”.

The expert team, funded by NASA through the University of Hawaii, is testing on how human would be able to survive on Mars-like conditions.

“The longer each mission becomes, the better we can understand the risks of space travel”, Binsted said in 2015 before the mission. Crews traveling to Earth’s neighbor would have to survive in an inhospitable environment and wait for the flawless planetary alignment to enable them to travel home.

Each scientist worked on research projects during their stay and learned how to get by with limited resources while avoiding personal conflicts within the confines of the dome.