Ms. McCausland's Class
First Baptist Church School
Mt. Pleasant, SC

"What are the space suits like? Are they heavy and hot?"

The space suits are FUN to wear!! But they can get hot and heavy after a while. Underneath the suit we wear loose garments such as athletic shorts, long underwear, long sleeve shirts, and a hat. The suit is one piece, made of a canvas material and zips up in the back. We wear hiking boots and black gators cover up the bottom part of our legs to protect us from mud. Under the helmet we wear a headset and walkie talkie to communicate with each other. The helmet is big and can echo inside it. The front is clear plastic and we have limited view in them. A water straw inside the helmet is connected to a camelpack filled with water. The back pack has a sturdy frame and box on the back with fans that blow air through hoses that connect to our helmets so we can breathe. The air also cools us down on hot days in the sun.

The suits are not to heavy at first, but can feel heavier after a few hours of doing work, but that is part of the experience, but does not compare to the fatigue Apollo Astronauts experienced. The last bit of the suit are thick black gloves which hampers our touch, feel, and dexterity. Gloves make it difficult to write notes, grab a rock, open our bags, and take photos.

One of our goals in this project is to automate notes and picture taking using voice commands like "Take a picture" or "Create a voice note" and the computer will record what we say. Bending over, kneeling, walking uphill are not impossible, but take getting used to: anything higher than knee high is very difficult to clamber over! Your field buddy should be there to help you if you fall down. We have to adapt our field styles to work within the constraints of the suit. Swinging a hammer can hit the helmet if we are not careful, also, we cannot get real close to the rocks to see tiny features with a magnifying glass.

Movement is also slower, so the distance we can cover is less than without the suits, so time needs to be used wisely and efficiently to accomplish a task. All in all, the suits are necessary for exploring Mars, and I still would like one of my own.

"Are the rocks mostly smooth or rough?"

Here on Mars, Abby and I have found only sedimentary rocks so far, though there are igneous rocks around. Most of the loose rocks that we find lying on the ground are smooth and rounded because they have been eroded by water. The smooth pebbles that we found in Candor Chasma in the stream channel are mostly made of quartz, more specifically a variety of quartz called chert. The chert (quartz) is very resistant, 7 out of 10 on Moh's scale of hardness (a scale that compares common minerals with everyday things like a copper penny). A diamond is 10 out of 10, just for comparison.

Water flowing of the rocks for many, many years, will round any jagged edges, so they pebble is nice and smooth. The layers or rock we see in the landscape are made of clays and mud and they are beautiful greenish and brown colors. These can be easily eroded by water, so the landscape has a very smooth and curved look to it, similar to a Dr. Seuss book. Within some of the clay beds there are beds of a white mineral which is very soft and you can scratch it with your fingernail (again a test for hardness) and this tells us that the mineral is gypsum. Above the clays and muds are some resistant rocks made of sandstone, which are more difficult for water to erode.

So when the water erodes the clays and muds beneath the sandstone, the sandstone can collapse in huge, rough, jagged, boulders down the hillside. The boulders are taller than I am (over 6 feet tall). In summary to your question, we find both smooth rocks and rough rocks here on Mars, but mostly, they are smooth.

Cheers,
Mr. Garry