SOL 5: From white to red
Today, the red planet turned into a white planet. It snowed all night long, and the ground was fully covered. We got to see a new landscape, but we couldn’t go out for an EVA in these conditions. As the day progressed, we watched the snow melt and the redness of Mars reappear in the late afternoon. It was a magnificent spectacle, especially from the Science Dome, which offers the best view of the station.
In the RAM, Célia and Félix finished assembling the Lab’Ex! After five months of hard work to develop this experiment, the whole crew celebrated this accomplishment. Over the radio, we heard this message: “Crew, this is Célia and Félix. We have the pleasure of telling you that the Lab’Ex is completely assembled,” followed by clapping from all the other crew members. The only thing left to do is to test it in the coming days!
In the meantime, Lou worked on one of her crew engineer projects. When we go outside for an EVA, we must spend five minutes in an airlock to equalize pressure between our station and the Martian environment. For now, we only use a stopwatch, but Lou designed “AirLocks,” which detect when the airlock is closed and start a countdown automatically. She wired them this morning and finalized the code and the assembly this afternoon.
Julien spent the whole day in the Science Dome to coordinate the sessions for the neuroergonomics experiment. Every crew member must perform a cognitive assessment every three days while wearing an electroencephalogram. Researchers from the ISAE-SUPAERO Neuroergonomics Center will then be able to study the impact of confinement on our performance thanks to the measurements of our cerebral activity. Adèle, Félix, Lou, Célia, and I performed one session today. Julien then completed the scientific summary of the week with Gaspard.
Adèle organized a fun exercise session this morning. The objective was to find papers hidden in the lower deck of the HAB as quickly as possible while the other crewmates were doing an exercise. Early in the afternoon, she headed to the GreenHab with Félix to water the plants.
In the afternoon, Gaspard and I worked on AMAIA to continue installing new functionalities. We also solved several issues we encountered during the first days of the mission.
Tomorrow is our rest day. Even on Mars, it is critical to get some free time to relax and recharge our batteries!
