Interesting article from the London Telegraph
here

You have to register to read it, but it's free.

The Mars Society has built a mock-up spaceship called the "Desert Research Station" in Utah. Tom Clancy and crew are living there. A British reporter joins them. He compares what they're doing to an "army training with wooden rifles". People may laugh now, but they are discovering a lot of procedures and ironing them out.

Just read the article. Um, it wasn't Tom Clancy, some other guy.
The article was very sympathetic, and not at all skeptical. I'm not saying that the psych aspect of this mission isn't important, nor has it been over looked. I'll be honest, considering the length of a Mars mission, I don't know of anyone, including my husband, who'd want to be cooped up with me for that amount of time.
A couple of years ago I was talking to a gentleman involved with the research for a manned Mars mission. He couldn't have cared less about the psych. He was concerned about getting the people there and back in one piece. This was, as I said, a couple of years ago, so I'm sure the research has advanced.
Lisa

They've been doing this stuff for a while now
check out the Artic links http://www.marssociety.org
& for UK people: http://www.marssociety.org.uk

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