MDRS Sol Summary Report for Sol 4
Crew geologist Roy Naor
Summary Title
Mars can be harsh but with Team PRIMA everything is under control!
Mission Status:
It’s Mars Northern hemisphere winter now and snow started falling from the thin CO2 atmosphere above us. However, Team PRIMA is a anti-hibernation crew and steaming up work as mission continues.
Sol Activity Summary:
When you are at the extreme, planning ahead might be the one thing that can do the trick and save ya’. As We have left two of our faithful rovers on the windy Plato of the mighty Tharsis Rise, towering above the vanguard first Martian permanent station, we had to plan a rescue mission to retrieve our tools, given the constraints of impending snowflakes. However, the EVA time in the Martian anoxic and radiative outdoor is expensive and we could not let ourselves spend this cost only on logistics. Hence we pulled from our science task list one of our prestige experiment that we were sent for to conduct on Mars. It was an experiment designed by Israeli high school youth to detect variances in rock type along the colorful slopes west to MDRS. Using remote sensing data, the students targeted coordinates along the slopes where there are noticeable change in color between two layers. The astronauts were directed to transect the slope bottom to top to take pictures and collect small sample from each different color rock. For the mission of retrieving the two ATVs the crew selected two of his brave scientists: crew geologist Roy “rocks for breakfast” Naor, for his knowledge of geology field work for conducting the students experiment, and GreenHab officer Richard “endolith for supper” Blake, for his bravery in fulfilling missions under stressful conditions and his high driving capabilities, as an Australian outback person (the rest will be told in the EVA summary ahead).
On the side of our innovative ISRU 3D printing project we are still having unsolved issues. It proves again that once you’re on Mars you can work only with what you have. Luckily enough, our crew Berber engineer Idriss “the dude” Sisaid, is the best man for the job, finding Macgyver solutions to force the printer into actions. More to come on this frontier. Our fine artist Niamh “all she touches is gold” Shaw working hard on creating our most important product- Team PRIMA outreach to the world arsenal of high quality media products. Our fearless leader, crew commander Michaela “multitasker” Musilova (MMM) is on the go with her students’ GreenHab experiment, and several other projects, while also working hard on managing the communication with earth and mission control to maintain our needs and duties.
Look Ahead Plan:
Team PRIMA holds to its mission statement to prove the concept of ISRU 3D printing of interlocking building blocks filled with local Martian regolith, as means of future technology to build more habitats on Mars, other than the vanguard MDRS.
Anomalies in work:
When the thin CO2 Martian atmosphere yield before the decreasing temperature and forced to give up on the bits of water vapors it holds, snow started to precipitate on the dry red planet and made the isolated crew reschedule all planed EVAs
Weather:
Morning frost stopped the common Requiring Slopes Lineae (RSL) from wetting the hills and making them slippery, at noon the snow came up and proved that this arid planet holds many more faces and mysteries than we previously withhold.
Crew Physical Status:
The crew is in good shape and eager to science the sh@#% out of all things on Mars.
EVA:
As planned, Rick and Roy (R&R) headed transecting the steep slopes of the foot of the Tharsis Rise. They were running on a mission against time to sample each change in color while the coming snow blows in the back of their neck (not literally as they were given the state of the art space suites). They succeeded in their mission and got back to their lost rovers. The road back on the mighty plato was much easier than the day before as the slime on the road was frozen solid. They reached back to the Hab not a minute to soon before finely snowflakes have touched the ground and colored the red planet white velvet.
One small EVA for the two men, but one giant leap for our understanding of the Martian environment- the samples will now undergo “field tests” to check if they hold different properties. The crew will take the samples back with him to Earth and send the rocks to the students in the Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel, where they will be analyzed by the youth scientists. We believe that by doing this experiment Team PRIMA will inspire their imagination and thirst to learn science.
Reports to be filed:
sol 4 summary
Eva report
Eva request
Commander’s report
Operations report
H&S report
Support Requested:
We asked previously these two questions several times, which have not been answered yet:
– Does anyone know where exactly the GPS are kept at MDRS? We haven’t come across them yet. Thanks!
– Rick made an inventory of the spices in the kitchen on sol 3, which was sent on sol 3. Please let us know that you have received this and stored it somewhere. Many thanks
