CHAPEA Crew Begins Stay Inside NASA’s Mars Habitat for Second Mission
On October 19, 2025, NASA launched its second CHAPEA (Crew Health and Performance Exploration Analog) mission, which will see a crew of four research volunteers—Ross Elder, Ellen Ellis, Matthew Montgomery, and James Spicer—living in a 1,700-square-foot 3D-printed habitat at the Johnson Space Center in Houston for 378 days. This mission aims to simulate the conditions of a real Mars mission, providing crucial data to inform future space exploration efforts. As part of their experience, the crew will conduct simulated “Marswalks” outside the habitat, donning spacesuits to navigate a red sand environment designed to mimic Martian terrain. The insights gained from this mission will be essential for NASA’s Human Research Program, as it seeks to mitigate the health and performance risks associated with long-duration spaceflight.
The CHAPEA mission is not just about experiencing life in a confined space; it is a comprehensive research endeavor. The crew will engage in various activities that reflect the challenges of a real Mars mission, including habitat maintenance, robotic operations, and crop cultivation. They will also face environmental stressors such as prolonged isolation, communication delays of approximately 22 minutes, and potential equipment failures. By studying how the crew responds to these challenges, researchers hope to develop effective protocols for future missions to Mars and beyond. As Grace Douglas, the CHAPEA principal investigator, noted, the data collected will help optimize mission planning and vehicle design, ultimately supporting NASA’s goal of sending astronauts to explore Mars.
This mission follows the successful completion of the first CHAPEA mission, which ended in July 2024, and builds on the knowledge gained from that experience. The insights gathered from CHAPEA missions are integral to NASA’s broader Human Research Program, which focuses on ensuring the health and well-being of astronauts as they embark on deep-space exploration. As we look ahead to a future where crewed missions to Mars become a reality, the lessons learned from CHAPEA will play a pivotal role in shaping the safety and success of these groundbreaking journeys.
CHAPEA mission 2 crew members (from left) Ross Elder, Ellen Ellis, Matthew Montgomery, and James Spicer pose in front of the door to the simulated Martian landscape for their first photo inside the CHAPEA habitat after their mission began in October 2025.
Credits: NASA/CHAPEA Crew
A crew of four research volunteers stepped inside NASA’s CHAPEA (Crew Health and Performance Exploration Analog) habitat on Oct. 19, marking the start of the agency’s second 378-day simulated Mars mission.
Ross Elder, Ellen Ellis, Matthew Montgomery, and James Spicer are living and working inside the roughly 1,700-square-foot 3D-printed habitat at the agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston until Oct. 31, 2026.
“The information and lessons learned through CHAPEA will inform real-life mission planning, vehicle and surface habitat designs, and other resources NASA needs to support crew health and performance as we venture beyond low-Earth orbit,” said Sara Whiting, Human Research Program project scientist. “Through these lessons, NASA’s Human Research Program is reducing human health and performance risks of spaceflight to enable safe and successful crewed missions to the Moon, Mars, and beyond.”
The crew will face the challenges of a real Mars mission, and only leave to perform simulated “Marswalk” activities directly outside the habitat, wearing spacesuits, to traverse a simulated Mars environment filled with red sand. During these Marswalks, they will remain isolated within the building that houses CHAPEA at NASA Johnson.
“These crewmembers will help provide foundational data for mission planning and vehicle design and inform trades between resources, methods, and technologies that best support health and performance within the constraints of living on Mars,” said Grace Douglas, CHAPEA principal investigator. “The information gained from these simulated missions is critical to NASA’s goal of sending astronauts to explore Mars.”
During the year ahead, the crew will complete a variety of activities designed to replicate life and work on a long-duration mission on Mars, including high-tempo simulated Marswalks, robotic operations, habitat maintenance, physical exercise, and crop cultivation. The mission also aims to investigate how the crew adapts and responds to various environmental stressors that may arise during a real Martian mission, including limited access to resources, prolonged isolation, 22-minute communication delays, and equipment failures. Researchers will study how the team manages these conditions, which will inform future protocols and plans ahead of future crewed missions to Mars.
The
first CHAPEA mission
, which took place in the same habitat, concluded on July 6, 2024.
The CHAPEA mission 2 main crew and two alternate crew members are pictured in front of the Space Exploration Vehicle, the prototype pressurized rover that transported crew members to the habitat at the start of the mission.
Credits: NASA/James Blair
Ross Elder, CHAPEA mission 2 commander, waves to agency leaders and staff who are supporting the mission before he steps into the habitat.
Credits: NASA/James Blair
Suzanne Bell, CHAPEA Mission 2 Co-Principal Investigator, offers remarks to crew members Matthew Montgomery, James Spicer, Ross Elder, and Ellen Ellis directly before they enter the habitat for the 378-day mission.
Credits: NASA/James Blair
____
NASA’s Human Research Program
NASA’s
Human Research Program
pursues methods and technologies to support safe, productive human space travel. Through science conducted in laboratories, ground-based analogs, commercial missions, the International Space Station and Artemis missions, the program scrutinizes how spaceflight affects human bodies and behaviors. Such research drives the program’s
quest
to innovate ways that keep astronauts healthy and mission ready as human space exploration expands to the Moon, Mars, and beyond.
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