Copyright © 2008 by Charles K. Shepherd. Published by The Mars Society with permission. Commander's Observations: NASA Spaceward Bound V / MDRS Crew 61

Conducting simulated space missions in analog facilities on Earth has valuable lessons to teach engineers, managers, students, and potential crewmembers that will improve designs and operations of the actual missions. That is why the Mars Society built, maintains, and operates these types of facilities, including the Mars Desert Research Facility (MDRS) in Utah, and why NASA sponsors the "Spaceward Bound " education outreach program at the MDRS and other sites. The author served as Commander for NASA Spaceward Bound V / MDRS Mission 61 in April 2007, and has spent the past three years building lunar habitat mockups at the NASA Johnson Space Center. This paper shares lessons and observations from his two-week experience in the MDRS that he is incorporating into this work at NASA-JSC, and compare and contrast his findings with those reported by the FMARS 2003 crew and Zubrin's "Mars on Earth"