Assault at Antarctic base could be a warning for future travellers to Mars

A tense situation among members of an isolated base in Antarctica could foretell conflicts among astronauts on a long distance journey to Mars.

The South African Antarctic research base, SANAE IV, is located at a remote location in East Antarctica. It hosts a nine-member team made up of a doctor, scientists, and engineers who spend 10 months in isolation during the harsh, dark southern winter.

Reportedly, an altercation between one of the members and the leader resulted in an alleged physical attack, death threats and sexual harassment. Names have not been released. According to a statement from South African government officials, the team is undergoing mediation and the accused person has written a formal apology. The statement says the issue is considered resolved and the team will not need to be evacuated. 

This type of conflict among people living in extreme isolation and confined quarters is a concern for planners of a much longer human mission to Mars. Travel to the red planet, using any currently available technology, will take roughly seven months one way. Once the crew arrives, they will have to remain there alone for almost another year waiting for the Earth to come around its orbit so it is on the same side of the sun as Mars for a return trip.

Then it will take another six or seven months to journey home. That is a total round trip journey of 750 to 1,000 days, depending on how much fuel you are willing to burn.

During that entire voyage, the crew will be completely on their own, confined to their spacecraft in interplanetary space, and to the habitat on the surface of Mars. If an emergency happens, a rescue mission is, optimistically, many months away. The isolation is aggravated by a communication lag. It can take up to 20 minutes for a radio signal to cover the distance between Mars and Earth. 

No one has ever spent that long in space. An experiment in Russia called Mars 500

 simulated such a mission in an enclosed habitat on Earth. That exercise examined the psychological factors of isolation, and while no physical altercations took place, if an emergency had arisen, all they had to do was open the door and step out. Martian explorers won’t have that option.

A great deal of research among crews on the International Space Station (ISS) has focused on the physical effects of long duration space flight, such as the loss of calcium in bones, muscle atrophy and vision problems. Many of these issues can be compensated for with daily exercise while in space.

NASA has also explored questions of psychological health on the ISS, though not for the extreme lengths of time a Mars mission would take.

We might get more insight with a recent inadvertent experiment. American astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore returned to Earth this week after being stranded on the space station for 286 days. Their return was delayed after their new Boeing Starliner spacecraft developed leaks when they launched last June.

However, both astronauts had flown in space multiple times before and endured long-duration flights. During their wait in space they participated in station operations, including spacewalks, to keep busy. It would certainly be interesting to debrief them to evaluate their mental well being during their unexpectedly long absence from Earth.

Developing the hardware to reach Mars and survive in the hostile environment will be difficult. Just think of the tribulations faced by SpaceX during the troubled development of their Starship upper stage, the vehicle that could enable a trip to Mars. Its first two flights have resulted in spectacular showers of rocket parts over the Gulf of Mexico.

But interplanetary travel will also require extensive psychological training and screening to ensure a crew can get along before they step aboard a rocket for a multi-year voyage.