CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- This summer, explorers in spacesuits designed to endure Mars' harsh conditions will venture out of their shelter and onto a desolate landscape unknown to most of humankind.
One will evaluate the needs of a Martian astronaut. Another will carry a shotgun to ward off polar bears.
Canada's Devon Island, north of the Arctic Circle, is the setting for this surreal scene.
There, NASA and Mars Society researchers are testing technologies to use on a manned mission to Mars. Their base is the Flashline Mars Arctic Research Station.
They picked Devon Island because it was about as rocky and remote as Mars. It is the world's largest uninhabited island.
"You have to fly to the end of the world and then take a small plane from there," said Mars Society member Frank Schubert, an architect from Denver who helped build the outpost.
The can-shaped shelter was dropped by parachute onto Devon Island's Haughton Crater last summer. After several mishaps, including the resignation of the first construction crew, the habitat is ready for residents this summer.
The station draws people from several disciplines. Geologists, doctors, filmmakers, physicists and roboticists will make 10-day visits beginning June 28.
They will test the atmosphere, analyze rock samples, figure out how much water people on Mars will use and test robots that could make the journey to Mars.
Pascal Lee, one of the summer's commanders and a program founder, insists the scientists are going there to do a lot of research.
"We're not playing Mars," he said.
The brown mountains, desolate landscape and near silence recall the rust-colored Mars surface beamed to Earth by robotic explorers during the past several years.
The project, run by the SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Institute, tries to simulate the Martian environment and people's possible adaptation to it as much as possible.
The single shelter building, built to look like a Martian lander, has two floors, including six bedrooms, a kitchen, a computer workbench, a geology and biology laboratory, a closet of communications equipment and a medical area.
When visitors want to go outside, they have to wait in the airlock for 20 minutes, and they must don a spacesuit.
The suit serves a practical purpose on Devon Island. The area has only about 10 days of summer, when it reaches 50 degrees Fahrenheit (10 degrees Celsius) outside. The rest of the time it can be cold, windy and rainy.
Some subtle differences exist between this encampment and one on Mars.
For instance, airplanes fly within three-quarters of a mile (a kilometer) of their camp. Their dog, Phobos, named after a Martian moon, guards against polar bears. And because the camp is so far north, there is nearly round-the-clock daylight. The shelter's toilet burns waste. They take sponge baths instead of showers.
For power, they have two gasoline-powered generators, which they affectionately call, "the nukes." Electrical generators on Mars likely will be nuclear-powered, Schubert said.
Like others in the Mars Society, Lee is a strong advocate for manned Mars missions.
"It's mankind's next greatest adventure," he said. "Humans need a new frontier. We keep striving and doing better things. I think eventually we'll become a spacefaring civilization."
For now, they eat mainly canned food at Devon Island. The temperature is not conducive to growing fruit and vegetables.
The six station residents aren't alone in this strange, stark world.
Tucked behind a mesa, half a mile away, is a city of NASA tents. NASA scientists began working in the area four years ago with the Haughton-Mars Project.
Between 20 and 30 scientists go to Devon Island every summer to study the site and expand NASA's ability to explore foreign lands. The research is similar to that conducted on the other side of the mesa, but these scientists don't have to follow the same strict rules as those living in the habitat module.
To involve more people, the Mars Society has a lighter station planned for the southwestern United States. Schubert said the group considered erecting it in the notorious Area 51, site of the alleged U.S. government cover-up of aliens. But they had trouble getting clearance for the international scientists.
For a close-up look at the new Mars station, the curious can visit Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex, where a model will be on display from July until Labor Day.
Schubert said he hopes the outpost will provide an example for young people.
"You don't have to be a fighter pilot to be a space pioneer," he said.
Published under license from FLORIDA TODAY. Copyright © 2001 FLORIDA TODAY. No portion of this material may be reproduced in any way without the written consent of
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