'We're ready to go - for real!' Astronauts prepared for Mars as they 'return home' after 500 days in windowless capsule
Six astronauts will 'return home' this week after spending 520 days in a windowless capsule on a simulated mission to Mars.
They will emerge from their spacecraft - an isolation facility at the Russian Institute for Biomedical Problems (RIBP) in Moscow - on Friday.
But they are already looking forward triumphantly to the ever-realistic possibility of sending man to the Red Planet for real.
The Mars500 crew, pictured here in September, will finally emerge from their capsule in Russian on Friday after a 520-day mock mission to Mars.
One of the astronauts on board, French engineer Romain Charles, said in a recent diary entry: 'Our international crew went through the Mars500 mission successfully and we're happy and proud to answer positively to the question asked a year-and-a-half ago: 'Is man able to endure, physiologically and psychologically, the confinement of a trip to Mars?' Yes, we're ready to go!'
The $15million Mars500 project is being conducted by the European Space Agency (ESA) and the RIBP with the aim of imitating a complete mission to Mars.
Since the astronauts boarded on June 3 last year, they have undergone experiments, carried out 'Mars Walks' in a car park outside a Moscow block of flats and monitored their own mental health and wellbeing.
Hardly a room with a view: The crew's spacecraft is actually an isolation facility at the Russian Institute for Biomedical Problems in Moscow.
The astronauts have a meal together, but there were times when a lack of family contact and little variation in food led to mental low points
The crew conducted various experiments on themselves to understand the physical and psychological demands of a long space mission. But perhaps importantly, they weren't able to simulate anti-gravity
Two of the Mars500 astronauts - Diego Urbina and Alexander Smoleyevsky - emerged from their spacecraft in February to walk on the 'surface' of Mars - a car park in Moscow
Journalists at the Korolev Space Mission Control Centre outside Moscow watch Italian Diego Urbina and Russian Alexander Smoleyevsky emerge from their spacecraft
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