Crew 162 Journalist Report Sol 13
February 5, 2016
Carmen Felix
Today is our last day in full sim and we are getting ready to finalize our
experiments and reports. It has been a fun day indoors, as we can’t do much
outside for the freezing weather. I must say that yesterday night and today
I have been feeling a little bit colder than other days, although the
heater is working, it seems it is so cold outside that it is not enough.
Early in the morning, I went outside to help with the engineering checks,
together with the Crew Engineer to help each other to do this as quick as
possible to go back inside to the warmth of our habitat.
It is nice to enjoy a good cup of hot chocolate while we warm ourselves up,
and work together. Today was all about science, filming, and writing
reports. We filmed part of the Spanish language documentary in the kitchen,
talking about food and cooking. We also worked on the Project Stardust
experiment, trying to find micrometeorites in the soil samples we collected
earlier in our mission. We did our Sociomapping questionnaire of the day,
and performed some brain exercises to keep ourselves focused and active.
During the afternoon, I did a quick inventory for the life science
equipment that is available here. This could help Team ISU to propose new
life science experiments in future rotations. We are also working on our
final mission report, and working on our social media as we post some new
blogs on our website. To finalize our mission, we also need to deliver a
food inventory, to prepare for the arrival of the following crew, which in
our case, we won’t be able to meet as they are arriving two weeks later.
I would have liked to spend more days with nice weather here on Mars, as I
was not expecting to have so much snow. I think this has limited us in some
of our activities, and in the use of the observatory. I would have liked to
have more time to look at the sky without freezing, but although the
weather was challenging, we all enjoyed our stay to the maximum. We would
love to come back again!
Mars has been a total experience for us!
Until the next time!