Dying On Mars

Candidates Vying to be Colonists

Award-Winning **VIDEO**

Skippy Massey
Humboldt Sentinel

Would you do it?

More than 200,000 people have applied to be on Mars One, a four-man mission to the Red Planet with no return voyage.

Scheduled to depart in 2024, the voyage will be humanity’s first attempts at colonizing another planet.

“If I Die on Mars” is a mini-documentary from the Guardian News contemplating what’s either a suicide mission or one of the most noble voyages a person could ever embark upon. 

Meeting three of the 660 remaining candidates currently competing for a spot on the team, we find out how they’re preparing for the fateful day when they find they’re leaving life as they know it on Earth forever, never to return.

It’s the first manned space flight to Mars– and perhaps a one-way suicide mission.  There’s the physics student in the UK, a young doctor from Mozambique, and an Iraqi-American woman, all happy to sacrifice their futures for a place in history.  Why do they want to leave Earth, and who are they leaving behind?

It’s a poignant exploration of sorts of the human condition.  Have the candidates ever had sex and will they miss it?  Have they been in love– and what happens if they’re chosen for the mission but hit by Cupid’s arrow right before takeoff?  Are they afraid of disappearing forever into the abyss of space?

There’s also the whole issue of mortality and dying alone.  And whether or not you’ve wasted your entire life on what turned out to be a fool’s errand. 

Prepare to be left wondering whether the sacrifice is worth the potential reward.  Should we feel incredible sadness or respect for the four explorers who will eventually embark into the vast unknown?

The list of candidate colonists will be whittled down again, to 28 to 40 candidates on February 16, 2015. 

Good luck and Godspeed.  You’ll need it.