Postcards from Mars

The following is the weekly update written by Kai Staats to his team, as completed each week for the past three years.

SAM Working Group,

Matthias, Trent, Bindhu, and Kai (that’s me) found each other in Texas for the eclipse and an ad hoc post-viewing lunch. On the way back to Arizona Trent and Matthias visited the Midland human-rated vacuum chamber with intent to expand the CHaSE offerings for pressure suit and related equipment testing. I worked all day Friday on the drive out and back again Tuesday with phone calls and support of Luna’s research, coordination with Red Hen Industries, and more.

As we are all aware, following the highly successful Imagination I crew at SAM and our well deserved week off, we’ve been focused almost entirely on preparation for the final major construction effort at SAM—the Mars yard crater.

Here at SAM Luna, Matthias, and I have slipped into a modified work program—no longer pushing against an impossible list of TODOs at a breakneck velocity; rather we are moving day to day, hour to hour, focused on a sequential list of projects that need to be done in preparation for the Mars yard crater. Our list of TODOs is maintained more on the black board than in digital form, which is ok given that we are just one month from completion of this major build session and the Analog Astronaut Conference.

Luna has applied her expertise in research (and shopping) to a running list of key elements needed for SAM in the coming month. In particular, she has found the elusive Polybond cement mix required for shotcrete applied to the foam sculpt of the Mars yard crater, and after more a week of research and phone calls secured the required 76 bags, scattered as they are across the state.

Matthias has a solid list of TODOs, from Ops to the Mars yard to electrical work in the lung. Today Matthias and Kai made a Home Depot run to secure another trailer of primary supplies required for the Mars yard construction effort that begins next week. Matthias, Kai, and Luna will tomorrow (Thr) complete primary construction of the synthetic lava tube from rebar and a new, wood super-frame to provide greater stability before the spray foam and cement are applied.

Ezio and Franco made good progress on the new SIMOC Live stand-alone unit, a single Raspberry Pi Zero with sensors that serves both as a data collection point and web server for local or remote web visualization. It’s an impressive, compact unit that could easily be packaged in a case smaller than a deck of cards. First prototypes will be shipped to test agents and the Lunares habitat analog for extensive testing prior to the World’s Biggest Analog, in which each analog will receive a similar stand-alone or (more likely) an ad hoc mesh array (as was in SAM for Imagination I).

Jason has completed a revised and highly accurate 3D model of SAM (see top) following his visit in February. Bryan will tomorrow (Thr) deliver his updated Mars yard 3D model for use as a rough guide and visualization tool. I am working with Tasha (ASU) to build a set of hi-res images, again a guide for both the Red Hen and SAM teams.

Bindhu is working on an updated set of procedures for preparing SAM for team arrival, an updated Cuff List, design of the Med Bay, continued effort for the SAM photo book, an umbrella IRB, and more as these efforts carry into the summer between her adventures to Nebraska and Namibia.

Chris continues to support Ezio as they try to determine why the Raspberry Pi at SAM is going down every hour after a power outage (even with the UPS). Very frustration and confusing.

Sean is working with Dr. James Knox (formerly at NASA) for the CO2 scrubber design, preparing to host a 3 days workshop on algae here at B2 and SAM, and arriving to SAM in a week to assist Matthias with replacing the Mars yard poly panels in the midst of the chaos of the Mars yard crater construction.

Sadly, Ezio departs a week from Friday. He has been instrumental in the success of our SIMOC Live air quality monitoring and data collection program at SAM, and diligent in maintaining an organized approach to a highly complex project with many avenues to explore.

Cheers!
kai

“When Danica Vallone of Red Hen Industries and I first discussed her proposal for how to build the SAM Mars yard, over dinner with Grant Anderson in January, I had already spent several months pursuing a more traditional rebar, metal lath and concrete or fiberglass mold approach. The right vendor for the right price had eluded me, with prices doubling since my first calls in 2021. In my mind foam felt too soft and something of a crumbling mess that could never successfully simulate the many features of a Martian landscape.

In the midst of our mutually busy schedules we traded my project needs against her team’s prior examples, then dove into the complex logistics for what would be a breakneck velocity in construction to finish in time for the Analog Astronaut Conference at Biosphere 2, third year in a row. We had to construct 180 linear feet of a Mars crater wall around a 2,600 sq-ft facility—fully sculpted, covered in concrete, and hand-painted in just 13 days. Nuts!

Once I was convinced this was not only possible but that it was in fact the ideal combination of media, we had to figure out how to get everything in place, in time. Danica had to pull sculptors, plasterers, and painters in southern California with absolute calendar precision between myriad other, established projects including a gig at South-by-Southwest and the total solar eclipse. My team had to wrap-up restoration of our Operations Center, install a point-to-point WiFi transmitter; complete, install, and test SIMOC Live v2.0; install the new hydroponics rack, host the third crew at SAM, and build a synthetic lava tube from rebar, chicken wire, and burlap cloth. Why not?

We then dove into the long shopping list provided by Red Hen in preparation for Mars yard construction including two semi-truck loads of foam blocks, buckets, garden hoses, rolls of paper, massive plastic tarps, a new 60 gallon air compressor, and a pallet of a Polybond cement mix shipped from the Arizona-California border, and more.” –Kai Staats, Director of Research for SAM at Biosphere 2

We know that human will very likely live partially if not entirely underground on Mars, in habitats constructed in massive lava tubes or structured buried beneath a few meters of Martian regolith—all in the name of radiation mitigation.

Therefore a lava tube was integrated into the SAM Mars yard from the opening discussion. When the Mars yard was to occupy the entire indoor space, the lava tube as to be roughly 25 feet deep and 12 feet tall. But with the SAM workshop taking form and the Mars yard redesigned to fit 2,600 sq-ft (roughly half of the total, usable indoor space), the lava tube was reduced to 15 feet deep by ten feet wide and a sloping 7 foot to 4 foot height. Even this relatively small space is completely engrossing once inside, and ample to pitch a pressurized tent, which is exactly what we intend to do.

While we investigated several construction techniques and various materials, we decided rebar and steel mesh (“chicken wire”) covered in high density spray foam was the way to go (see Sculpting SAM: Days 4-6).

Two full truckloads of foam arrived, the blocks being 4’x4’x8′, 2’x4’x’8, and 2’x2’x8′ per our carefully planned order and design. They will be placed in their intended position for the Red Hen sculpting team, carved, then glued in place before being covered in sprayed concrete (“shotcrete”) and painted.

The process of carving the foam generates a heavy amount of waste, a form of plastic that is not readily recyclable. The SAM team researched ways in which the waste can be used and learned about “styrocrete”, a kind of concrete mix that blends styrofoam with sand, aggregate, and cement to form structural blocks. It is the intent of the SAM crew to capture and store every bit of the foam during the carving process, and then deliver the remnants to a concrete manufacturing facility.