That people will travel to Mars, and soon, is a widely accepted conviction within NASA. Rachel McCauley, until recently the acting deputy director of NASA’s Mars campaign, had, as of July, a punch list of 800 problems that must be solved before the first human mission launches. Many of these concern the mechanical difficulties of transporting people to a planet that is never closer than 33.9 million miles away; keeping them alive on poisonous soil in unbreathable air, bombarded by solar radiation and galactic cosmic rays, without access to immediate communication; and returning them safely to Earth, more than a year and half later. But McCauley does not doubt that NASA will overcome these challenges. What NASA does not yet know — what nobody can know — is whether humanity can overcome the psychological torment of Martian life.
A mission known as CHAPEA, an experiment in which four ordinary people would enact, as closely as possible, the lives of Martian colonists for 378 days, sets out to answer that question.
The Sunday Read: ‘How Tom Sandoval Became the Most Hated Man in America’
Biden, Trump and a Split Screen at the Texas Border
How Poisoned Applesauce Found Its Way to Kids
An Arms Race Quietly Unfolds in Space
The Voters Willing to Abandon Biden Over Gaza
The Alabama Ruling That Could Stop Families From Having Kids
The Sunday Read: ‘How Do You Make a Weed Empire? Sell It Like Streetwear.’
Trump’s Cash Crunch
Putin’s Opposition Ponders a Future Without Aleksei Navalny
What Happens if America Turns Its Back on Its Allies in Europe
Stranded in Rafah as an Israeli Invasion Looms
The Booming Business of Cutting Babies’ Tongues
Sunday Special: Un-Marry Me!
An Explosive Hearing in Trump’s Georgia Election Case
How China Broke One Man’s Dreams
The Biden Problem Democrats Can No Longer Ignore
Why the Race to Replace George Santos Is So Close
Why Boeing’s Top Airplanes Keep Failing
The Sunday Read: ‘The Unthinkable Mental Health Crisis That Shook a New England College’
Kick Trump Off the Ballot? Even Liberal Justices Are Skeptical
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
Up First
Today, Explained
Post Reports
What Next | Daily News and Analysis
The Rachel Maddow Show