Dealing with a physically disabled crew member: Lessons learned by the crew of the ICAres-1 mission

The standard for designing manned missions today is to assume that a crew flying to the Moon or to Mars is healthy and physically fit - and remains healthy and fit during the duration of the mission. However, common sense predicts that it is just a matter of time until the first accidents occur during planetary surface missions, accidents that may handicap crew members temporarily or even permanently. For this reason, the former Laboratory of Extreme Medicine at the University of Medical Sciences in Poznan has conducted the first ever analog mission with one physically disabled crew member. This mission with the name ICAres-1 (short for Innovative Concepts Ares) took place at the Polish LUNARES habitat in the October of 2017 and initially comprised a tri-national 6-person crew, 3 males and 3 females, which was reduced to 5 crew members a few days into the mission due to circumstances unrelated to the mission. One crew member, an engineer by training, had lost eyesight and the greater part of their two hands about 10 years prior to the mission. Consequently, unlike most missions which simulate first arrival on Mars, ICAres-1 is set long after the first arrival, up to perhaps 10 years, which shifts the mission scenario to a near-permanent settlement. Members of the crew will present here the lessons they learned during the 2-week simulation. In particular, we will discuss the necessarily made adjustments to schedules provided by mission support, the influence of a physically disabled crew member on group dynamics, and ways in which architectures of surface habitats can be improved to accommodate injured or disabled astronauts.