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Sol Summary – March 21st

Crew 309 Sol Summary Report 21Mar2025

Sol: 5

Summary Title: Final Day

Author’s name: Co-Commander A

Mission Status: Nominal

Sol Activity Summary:

  • We conducted 3 EVAs today. GreenHab and Engineer went in the morning, commander A and Medic in the afternoon, and commander B and Scientist last. The crew began the cleaning process completing the RAM, GreenHab, and Food Inventory tasks this evening. Simulation ended after dinner and the crew was able to explore some of the Martian terrain outside of our EVA suits.

Look Ahead Plan: We will be packing up and heading home in the morning.

Anomalies in work:

  • During prep for our second EVA of the day, we determined that the helmet had become detached from the spacesuit worn by crew member one. Engineer, Medic, and Commander A were able to repair the suit for the remainder of the EVAs. A more permanent solution will be required for future missions.

Weather: Windy, 34F / 62F

Crew Physical Status: Nominal

EVA: 3 EVAs completed

Reports to be filed: Sol Summary, Journalist Report, GreenHab, Operations Report, Mission Summary

Support Requested: None

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Operations Report – March 21st

SOL: 5

Name of person filing report: Jesús, Crew Engineer

Non-nominal systems: None

Notes on non-nominal systems: None

ROVERS

Spirit rover : used (EVA 2)

Beginning Hours: 268.9

Beginning charge: 100%

Ending Hours: 269.5

Ending charge: 65%

Currently charging: yes

Opportunity rover: used

Beginning Hours: 209.1

Beginning charge: 100%

Ending Hours: 209.5

Ending charge: 73%

Currently charging: yes

Curiosity rover: used

Beginning Hours: 302.5

Beginning charge: 100%

Ending Hours: 302.7

Ending charge: 80%

Currently charging: yes

Perseverance rover: used

Beginning Hours: 312.3

Beginning charge: 100%

Ending Hours: 312.7

Ending charge: 84%

Currently charging: yes

General notes on rovers: Worked as expected.

Summary of Hab operations: Cleaning, cooking, EVA preparation, packing

Water Use (please use both methods to estimate water usage)

Time of measurements: 5:00 pm
1) Per formula (see notes): 33.98 gal
2) Smart Home Dashboard (see notes): 45.34 gal

Water (static tank, remaining gallons): 330.58 gal (based on Smart Home)

Static tank pipe heater (on or off): on

Static tank heater (on or off) : off

Toilet tank emptied (no or yes): no

Summary of internet: will be using from 7 pm onwards for reports, indefinitely due to yesterday’s malfunction

Summary of suits and radios:

Suits :

1 -> 100%, used

2 -> 100%, used

3 -> 100%, not used

Suits : Lost upper-left nut and bolt that fastened helmet to backpack. Replaced using bolt and washers from repair kit but had to use a nut from RAM due to improper fitting of available nuts in repair kit.

Radios : Nothing to report.

Summary of GreenHab operations: Plants were watered.

WATER USE: 9 gallons

Heater (On or Off): On

Supplemental light (hours of operation): 5 to 10 pm

Harvest (name, weight in grams):

Scallions: 69 g

Summary of ScienceDome operations: None

Dual split (Heat or AC, On or Off): Off

Summary of RAM operations: (Tools used, work done): Commandeered hex nut for EVA suit repair.

Summary of any observatory issues: None

Summary of health and safety issues: None

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GreenHab Report – March 21st

GreenHab Officer: Prachi Dutta

Environmental control (fan & heater): Yes

Average temperatures (last 24h): 86 F

Maximum temperature (last 24h): 131 F

Minimum temperature (last 24h): 40.8 F

Hours of supplemental light: 5pm-10pm

Daily water usage for crops: 9 Gallons

Daily water usage for research and/or other purposes: None

Water in Blue Tank (200 gallon capacity): 161 gallons

Time(s) of watering for crops: 1.00 pm

Changes to crops: None

Narrative: Watered, cleaned the crops, pulled out the weeds. Sweeped and cleaned the GreenHab for our departure tomorrow.

Harvest: 69g scallions

Support/supplies needed: None

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Journalist Report – March 21st

Here is our Journalism report for today.
Strangers to Martians
When we started the Mars mission just a few Sols ago each of us was almost a complete stranger to rest with almost no idea of what we had really signed ourselves up for and now after 5 days in each other’s constant company we have become a true Mars crew. Our crew bonded through the endless training on Sol 0 and then sorting through that same information to determine our crew responsibilities on Sol 1. We got to work with each other to solve problems on EVAs, learning more about each other each time we were paired with someone new. We did daily activities together and exchanged ideas on life habits like how we each like to exercise or how our crew scientist likes to eat random handfuls of spinach to hit her daily veggie count (it’s honestly better than one might expect). We had casual conversations about our lives and our individual research and played games like Pictionary that resulted in an abundance of laughs. We vlogged our Martian cooking, including a few mishaps, and tried lots of dehydrated food for the first time. We gazed up at the stars and wondered whether we could ever explore the entirety of our vast universe. And now on Sol 5 as we approach the end of our mission, we’re conducting our final EVA’s; cleaning the hab; and savoring our last moments on Mars.

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Sol Summary – March 20th

Crew 309 Sol Summary Report 20Mar2025

Sol: 4

Summary Title:

Author’s name: Co-Commander A

Mission Status: Nominal

Sol Activity Summary:

  • Commander A and B went on an EVA in the morning. The crew scientist and engineer continued troubleshooting the eye tracking equipment and think they have found a solution, but they are unable to implement it due to a lack of an ethernet cable on Mars. The entire crew continued working on the mission vlog throughout the day. In the afternoon the Greenhab and science officer went on and EVA. Martian activity was high today. A malfunction of the wifi system delayed crew reports by 2+ hours.

Look Ahead Plan: We will be conducting three EVAs tomorrow in the morning and afternoon

Anomalies in work:

  • The Tobbii eye tracking glasses are now not connecting to either computer at all. Scientist is troubleshooting.
  • We found a potential default setting which may be shutting the Tobii controllers down when it starts to go low on the battery. An ethernet cable needs to be used to connect the controllers. The app may also be out of date. We also were able to reconnect the glasses, the default password needed to be used.
  • We tried to use the Tobii glasses without an internal battery but just with the external battery, this approach was not effective.

Weather: Windy, 61F / 26F

Crew Physical Status: Nominal

EVA: 2 EVAs completed

Reports to be filed: Sol Summary, Journalist Report, GreenHab, Operations Report

Support Requested: None

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Journalist Report – March 20th

Journalist Report
Sol 4: Observations from the Observed
Throughout the week we’ve been monitored by a variety of sensors and surveys as part of the research study we’ve agreed to be the “pilot” crew for. Our role is to help the research team discover any oversights or logistical challenges in their experimental plan so that the first real test crew has a smoother experience – because our experience has been bumpy to say the least. We can’t say much about the surveys, but we can talk about the sensors. Our only constant sensor is a Garmin watch to record our heart rate and sleep quality – we only take them off to charge during dinner. There are few other sensors we only use during EVAs. The first is just a simple audio recorder which we clip to the collar of our flight suit so that the researchers can understand how we’re communicating when we plan and conduct our EVA. Next, we have a tracking device so that the researchers can see where we’re going and a secondary MDRS tracker required for crew safety. Lastly, we have eye tracking glasses that video what we see and identify exactly what our eyes are focusing on – this again allows the researchers to understand what information we’re taking in and using to build our decisions on EVA. Not only are we responsible for donning these sensors each day, but our crew scientist and engineer have sunk several hours into debugging them, especially the glasses. As of today, we have solved multiple problems with the glasses only to find more. The latest discovery is a settings change that requires an ethernet cable that does not exist on Mars. Who puts an ethernet cable on their packing list anyways?

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GreenHab Report – March 20th

GreenHab Officer: Prachi Dutta

Environmental control (fan & heater): Yes

Average temperatures (last 24h): 84.6 F

Maximum temperature (last 24h): 131 F

Minimum temperature (last 24h): 40.8 F

Hours of supplemental light: 5pm-10pm

Daily water usage for crops: 7 Gallons

Daily water usage for research and/or other purposes: None

Water in Blue Tank (200 gallon capacity): 170 gallons

Time(s) of watering for crops: 1.30 pm

Changes to crops: None

Narrative: Watered, cleaned the crops, pulled out the weeds.

Harvest: None

Support/supplies needed: None

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Operations Report – March 20th

SOL: 4

Name of person filing report: Jesús, Crew Engineer

Non-nominal systems: Wi-fi

Notes on non-nominal systems: Wi-fi failed to turn on during the regular window, believe the cause was due to the outages from earlier in the day.

ROVERS

Spirit rover : not used

Opportunity rover: not used

Curiosity rover: used

Beginning Hours: 302

Beginning charge: 100%

Ending Hours: 302.5

Ending charge: 88%

Currently charging: yes

Perseverance rover: used

Beginning Hours: 312

Beginning charge: 100%

Ending Hours: 312.3

Ending charge: 78%

Currently charging: yes

General notes on rovers: Worked as expected.

Summary of Hab operations: Exercise activities, cooking, EVA preparation, equipment troubleshooting

Water Use (please use both methods to estimate water usage)

Time of measurements: 5:00 pm
1) Per formula (see notes): 28.75 gal
2) Smart Home Dashboard (see notes): 42.27 gal

Water (static tank, remaining gallons): 375.92 gal (based on Smart Home)

Static tank pipe heater (on or off): on

Static tank heater (on or off) : off

Toilet tank emptied (no or yes): yes

Summary of internet: will be using from 9 pm to 11 pm for reports

Summary of suits and radios:

Suits :

1 -> 100%, used

2 -> 100%, used

3 -> 100%, not used

Suits : Nothing to report.

Radios : Nothing to report.

Summary of GreenHab operations: Plants were watered.

WATER USE: 7 gallons

Heater (On or Off): On

Supplemental light (hours of operation): 5 to 10 pm

Harvest (name, weight in grams): None

Summary of ScienceDome operations: None

Dual split (Heat or AC, On or Off): Off

Summary of RAM operations: (Tools used, work done): None

Summary of any observatory issues: None

Summary of health and safety issues: None