Life on Mars

Wim Dijkshoorn was one of more than 200,000 astronaut candidates from around the world vying for a one-way ticket to Mars with the Mars One space initiative. The nonprofit mission intends to establish a permanent human settlement on our neighboring planet, starting with a group of four leaving Earth in 2024.

On February 16, Dijkshoorn found out he was not selected as one of the final 100 candidates for the Mars mission. After the cut, he told DW about the experience.

How did the process of applying for a one-way trip to Mars change you?

If you are selected in the first round and the second round, it slowly becomes more and more concrete. People start asking questions, and you have to start asking deeper questions: "Why do you want to leave and what are your ideas about it?" But also I think I value more my relationships with family and friends. I think they have become stronger because I had to express to them, "Why am I leaving you?"

What was the most unexpected thing about the process?

Maybe at first when I applied I was a little bit more enthusiastic and passionate about it. But then along the way, I became more critical toward the project. I really kept thinking about technical issues - though that's not necessarily my background - but more, what would it really mean if people would go and live there and what the ideas are of the organization.

At first I thought, this is a great project and this is possible and we're going to do that. And I still think it is technically possible. But I learned that there are a lot more issues that you have to look at, just from a technical side: living there, and the psychological perspective. I became more aware of the aspects of living on Mars, you could say.

What was one of the biggest technical challenges for the Mars mission that you began to worry about during the selection process?

On the technical side, most of the issues are known already. Living on Mars is, you could say, the easy part. But traveling to Mars is the most dangerous part because there is a lot of radiation. And it's not clear what the effects are on organic life and humans.

But I think more, it's the people who are going there - how will their daily life be? Because in the end you can have all this technology, but you really need to have good thought about how people are going to live there and in what kind of an environment. And how will you prepare people for that?

In all the simulation missions, it has become obvious that you can have all those special projects and do a lot of research, but in the end you become more and more bored. There are always the same people around you. There are no other inputs like from nature on earth or people, or other places you can go to. So, that's one of the questions I became more and more aware of. I still haven't found an answer to that. What would be the best way for a group of people to live there and not become entirely isolated and become so bored that they at the end have a horrible life?

With your knowledge of the mission as a former candidate, do you think it will eventually be successful?

Yes, I think they are going to succeed. Because at the moment, I have the feeling that more and more people are becoming more interested in this kind of thing, and more and more people are thinking about what it means to live in isolation or why we should go to another planet to live there. I think that interest is growing and it is becoming less and less something that is completely out of this world.

What is the biggest misconception about Mars One that people on the outside don't understand?

I think a lot of people have the idea that people who have chosen this mission are people that are in some way trying to run away from the problems in their lives or don't like it here on Earth. But I think most people who are still in the mission, they really are just incredibly curious. They really value their lives here on Earth, but they have the opportunity to work on such an interesting project. So they are not weird people, they are normal people with a little more interest in things.

Wim Dijkshoorn is 21 years old and lives in Nijmegen, the Netherlands.