Commander's Report

February 5, 2008

John Thaler



Today the crew was busy as bees in springtime. A wide variety of
maintenance projects were undertaken and successfully completed,
several culinary exploits were undertaken and the mission scientists
have made great progress on setting up for their projects. It is
amazing how efficiently the crew is working together and we are all
proud of what we have accomplished given that today was our first day
"in Sim".

First off a few words about food. Cheryl went into "Mom" mode and
whipped up some bread that is just rising now and will be a delicious
before-bed snack. Nasim was maintaining the GreenHab plants,
transplanting the larger ones into bigger pots so they have room and
she found two small mature radishes that we'll enjoy with dinner
tonight.

Second, the engineers fixed many of the outstanding problems with
systems. Our power problems are a thing of the past now that a high
capacity cable + plug was assembled and the generator was moved back to
the engineering area. This allows us to send power through the Xantrex
rather than into the batteries via the chargers. With this power
source in the engineering area they were able to successfully fill the
Hab potable water tanks from the permanent outside water tank which
meant that the trailer water tank could be moved out of sight to the
engineering area. I spent the morning fixing EVA suit bugs starting
with Suit 1's air supply which had a disconnected wire and wasn't
charging properly. I then replaced the radio connection in Helmet 3
which was not transmitting properly. Kerry, our geologist and
unofficial technology officer attempted to figure out why our internet
was so slow, and the going theory is that we overstepped our download
limit and were put on probation for 24 hrs. In the afternoon the
engineers took a look at the water heater problem with the assistance
of Don and unfortunately this is one of the outstanding problems we
were unable to solve during our productive day. Anna and I spent the
afternoon tackling the GreenHab water systems. We cleaned the trickle
filter sprayers and the pump filters and noticed an immediate
improvement in flow. After Mic and Anna manually pumped grey water
into the trickle tanks we allowed water to flow through the cascading
tanks returning them to nominal levels. Hopefully this helps revive
the aquatic plants. The next task in the GreenHab will be to reconnect
the Macerator pump so we won't have to manually pump the grey water
anymore. Finally as the crew was writing up their reports this evening
I got downright domestic and sewed up the gaping hole in the crotch of
EVA suit 4.

The scientists were equally as busy today with Kerry, Cheryl and Anna
making the first science EVA of the mission to test Kerry's soil gas
analysis equipment. Several lessons were learned and Kerry spent the
afternoon modifying his equipment and protocols to be ready for another
trial EVA tomorrow. Cheryl, after assisting Kerry and getting quite
the workout learning to use the auger, went on to do some preliminary
water testing to get ready for tomorrow when her Daphnia will arrive.
Arthur has selected the items he will be placing in his logistics box
and attached RFID tags to these items. The inventory of the logistics
box can be checked online but for more information see his science
report. Arthur also acted at HabCom today, coordinating communications
between EVA groups, maintenance crews and food selection committees.

Tonight we begin our evening series of lectures with Cheryl who will be
giving the crew a short biology talk. This will be followed by a fun
game, our first such activity since all our previous attempts at social
activities have been preempted by emergencies or report writing.

Tomorrow's activities include the second trial EVA for Kerry's
equipment, an EVA by the engineers up Radio Ridge to scout a route for
a power cable to an improved satellite system. Tomorrow the evening
lecture series will include an introduction to Field Data Management
(FDM) protocols.

I really can't say it enough, I'm super proud of how much our crew has
accomplished today, our first day in full Mars simulation.