MARS 500

In the meantime, China went to Mars – but on the ground. This was a 520-day-long ground experiment conducted by Russia, which had a long history of simulating long-duration missions going back to 1968, when three men made a year-long “spaceflight”. These tests were important for addressing life-support, ergonomic, medical, biological, and psychological issues long ahead of the real thing. In the early 2000s, Russia announced its intention of simulating a full-duration Mars mission in its Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP) in Moscow, using its simulation module called “the box” (“botchka” in Russian), a habitat of 550 m3. It would be as lifelike as possible, with a simulated landing on Mars for half the crew (while the other half orbited above) with a Mars walk and even a 40-min delay in transmission times to match the real delay at such a distance. Although these simulations were ridiculed in the British press (“Why don’t they simulate the Olympics too?”), they had a serious purpose in laying the groundwork for the definitive mission many decades later.

Originally, it was a Russian-European project. There were lengthy delays in getting it started, probably due to lack of money on the Russian side, to the point that a 105-day simulation was run instead from March to July 2009 with four Russians, a German, and a Frenchman. At one stage, it seemed that Mars 105 might be an abbreviated conclusion to the project but, suddenly, in April 2010, the Russian-European Mars 500 project was on again – but this time with a Chinese crewman, Dr Wang Yue, aged 27. He was a graduate of Nanjing Medical College in preventative medicine (in 2005) and went straight from there to the astronaut training center to work as a physiologist, being closely involved in the Shenzhou 7 space walk and the selection of China’s third group of astronauts. It was an all-male group (Russia seemed to have a problem including women in these tests) of four Russians, two Europeans (France and Italy), and a Chinaman. There is reason to believe that China was able to pay sufficient money for its participation to make the mission economical for the IMBP, which may have explained its sudden restart.

The Mars 500 botchka at IMBP in Moscow. Courtesy: ESA.

The mission began at 11:49 European time on 3rd June 2010, with the door of the bochka being ceremonially shut. Key simulated moments of a Mars mission followed, such as a mid-course correction on 24th December and entry to Mars orbit on 2nd February 2011 after 244 days. Forty days into the mission, communications were interrupted because of a solar storm. Later, there was a power cut – all part of a process of testing the men’s self-reliance. The high point of the experiment was when a sub-crew of three – Alexander Smolevsky, Diego Urbina, and Wang Yue – made a simulated landing on Mars on 12th February. For this, they transferred to a separate landing module measuring 6.3 x 6.17 m – their sole home for 16 days. Getting out on the surface, they made three space walks using real Russian Orlan spacesuits, each led by the Russian, with Wang Yue’s big moment taking place on 18th February. The cosmonauts traversed a simulated Martian terrain of 10 x 6m – actually part of the car park at the back – modeled on Gusev crater, where they collected samples, drove a rover, and planted the Russian, European, and Chinese flags. At night, Wang Yue slept in a 35-kg spacesuit at an angle with his head down to simulate the gravity of Mars after a long period of weightless, feeling the blood rush to his head. Then they left Mars on 23rd February, docked in Mars orbit four days later, and headed out Earthward on 1st March.

During the mission out to Mars and the long, monotonous journey home, Wang Yue provided daily blood and urine samples. He had his own 3-m2 cabin, where he hung a picture of Yang Liwei. The cosmonauts exercised regularly. Much of the day was spent on experiments, maintenance, and cleaning, as on a real spaceship. The

Chinese, European, and Russian cosmonauts walked on the “surface” of Mars in Moscow. Courtesy: DLR.

experiment he most disliked was an attention-level test in which he had to use a cursor to move 16 randomly swirling dots into a bubble. They could bring a small number of personal items on board, such as books, videos, and laptops. They spent a lot of time e-mailing friends, Wang Yue writing to his girlfriend but complaining that she did not write enough back. He spoke later of how his mood would fluctuate, at times becoming depressed and angry. For recreation, the crew watched videos, generally comedies and cartoons. Once they watched the film Apollo 13, but it left them depressed for days. The working languages of the mission were Russian and English, but Wang Yue initiated a course in basic Chinese for his colleagues. In an internet broadcast from the botchka on cosmonautics day, 12th April (the 50th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin’s flight), Wang Yue spoke in excellent English about how much Gagarin had been an inspiration to him.

The doors of the botchka did not swing open again until November, when, in an event televised across Europe, the crewmembers emerged in their blue coveralls and bhnked in the natural Ught and the camera flashes of the hundreds of friends, family, and well-wishers who gathered to welcome them back to the real world.

Later, speaking of the mission, Wang Yue told viewers that the experiment had proved harder than he expected, but he had never thought of giving up and had received good support from family and friends. Readjustment after the mission was a challenge. He had difficulty sleeping and found everyday life very noisy after the quiet of the botchka. Director of the astronaut training center in Beijing, Chen

Shanguang, described his contribution to a future Mars mission as heroic, while IMBP deputy director and cosmonaut Boris Morukov commended his teamwork and determination. Wang Yue told of how he had spent his time off in reading, board games, and calligraphy, and had followed closely the rescue of the Chilean miners who had been trapped underground. Asked what he missed most, Wang Yue was very clear: home Chinese cooking. The food – which was similar to that on the International Space Station – was not enjoyable, he said, but it kept him from starving and gave him some energy. He had spent two birthdays on the Mars flight and was 29 when he returned. He volunteered that he was prepared to do the experiment again – “but not right yet”. A mission highlight was taking a shower every 10 days (so limited so as to conserve water). He went on a well-deserved holiday in Kunming, Yunan, and managed to put back on some of the 5-kg weight he had lost during the mission.

The mission was followed by a team of ESA psychologists led by Bernadette van Barsen of the Netherlands. Initial results showed that the crew had stood up well to the early part of the mission, but with morale dipping several months in but then recovering when the Mars landing approached. In a post-conference presentation of the results, the head of IMBP Anatoli Grigoriev spoke of the importance of the experiment in identifying the psycho-physiological stress points of a mission to Mars, such as decreased motor activity (hypokinesia), monotony, and frustration, as well as risks of cardiac arrhythmia and the demineralization of bones and tissue. Although this part of the mission was not simulated, experts were already alert to the problem of cancers from prolonged exposure to solar radiation – one which suggested that older astronauts should fly, for they would spread more slowly. Granted that astronauts were now flying in their fifties (John Glenn had famously flown at 77), Wang Yue could, even in 30 years’ time, be of a suitable age for such a mission. Would Wang Yue be the first Chinese man on Mars? Or would he follow down the ladder Liu Yang, the first Chinese woman?

CONCLUSIONS: TO THE MOON AND MARS

The lunar program was, like others, a beneficiary of project 863 (see Chapter 4), which enabled pre-studies to be undertaken of a lunar mission. Indeed, Deng Xiaoping’s wisdom in approving a horizontal science program as far back as 1986 became more apparent, for it made it possible for scientific objectives to reassert themselves within the space program and permitted ground work to be done thoroughly before a government decision (in 2003). It is possible that the success of the early Shenzhou missions gave China the final confidence necessary to proceed with a lunar mission, leading to the first launching to the Moon, Chang e, in 2007, followed by a second mission in 2010, Chang e 2. China was able to keep its costs down by using spacecraft originally developed for other missions, such as the DFH-3, and by adapting instrumentation from Earth resources satelhtes. The trajectories followed for both lunar missions were difficult and ambitious, for both Chang e’s elliptical trajectory to the Moon and Chang e 2’s subsequent move to L2 required considerable precision, navigation, computer power, and tracking. Their missions were carried out with apparently effortless ease – evidence of rapidly rising standards within the program and the thoroughness of preparatory work. The product of Chang e was a substantial body of indigenous scientific knowledge, giving China new, precise topographic and chemical lunar maps, with the identification of fresh lunar features and a new understanding of the regolith. They gave China a place in the international scientific community analyzing the Moon – a promising background for the rover and sample return missions to follow. Although the opportunistic but clever Yinghuo mission came to nothing, plans were already in preparation for missions to Mars from 2015. Preparatory work was even undertaken for a later manned mission to Mars, the Mars 500, over 2010-11. The years 2007-12 clearly marked a fresh dimension to China’s space program: its arrival in the field of missions to deep space.