NASA Will Pay You to Pretend to

Live on Mars
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 NASA Will Pay You to Pretend to Live on Mars
Would you like to experience life on the red planet? If so, NASA has a job for you!
To prepare to send astronauts to Mars, NASA has begun taking applications for four people
to live for a year in Mars Dune Alpha — a 160-square-meter Mars habitat that was made
using a 3D printer inside a building at Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas.

The paid volunteers will pretend to work on a Mars mission, with spacewalks, equipment
problems, few choices for food and materials, and little communication back home.

NASA is planning three of these experiments, with the first starting in the fall of 2022.
NASA isn't looking for just anybody, however. People who apply must have a master's
degree in science, engineering or math, or have experience as a pilot. Only American
citizens or permanent US residents can apply. They also have to be between 30 and 55, and
in good health.
Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, who spent five months on the
International Space Station in 2013, said it's good that NASA is looking for
people who will be similar to the astronauts that will really go to Mars. He said
a past Russian experiment had problems because the participants were too
much like normal people.

He said that participants would need to be like Matt Damon's character in the
movie The Martian: resourceful, very good at their jobs, and not relying on
other people to feel comfortable. Hadfield also said the long mission would be
a good time to watch Netflix or learn an instrument.
Questions

1. When is NASA's first experiment expected to start?

2. Who can apply for the program?

3. Who is Chris Hadfield?

Discussion
1. What are your thoughts on NASA's experiment?

2. Do you think you'd make a good candidate for the program? Why?
Why not?

3. What do you think you'd find most difficult about staying in Mars
Dune Alpha for a year?

4. If you were offered a chance to spend five months on the

International Space Station, would you take it?

5. What do you imagine would be the first thing you'd want to do upon
returning to Earth after a long space mission?
Further Discussion
1.What nation or organization do you think will get to Mars first? Why?

2.Do you like science fiction movies? Have you seen The Martian?

3.Do you use Netflix? If so, what's the last thing you watched?

4.Do you know how to play any instruments? If so, when did you learn?

5. If you could take a few months off work, how would you spend that
time?
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