Raine Light dropped her coffee when she read the simple e-mail informing her she’d made the first cut; for a one-way trip to Mars.
Of the 200,000 people who’d applied to be part of the Mars One Project, Raine Light of Kamloops, British Columbia, is now among the 1,058 people that will undergo an interview in the next couple of days.
Then people will be eliminated down to the final 60 that will begin training in groups of 4, in preparation for the first quartet’s lift-off in 2023. The next quartet leaves two years later.
Raine Light is planning to study medicine on earth, while considering if she’s ready to take the one-way trip for the betterment of humanity.
The aspects of adventure and doing something completely outlandish
At the moment she’s waiting for the phone call for the interview that will determine the next stage of her future. And she has many questions.
In an interview with CBC Kamloops, she considered the idea of “settling” on Mars, and wonders whether there will be “really interesting medical benefits that will come out of it?”
Raine Light acknowledged that “the aspects of adventure and doing something completely outlandish” play a part in her yearning, but she clarified a larger vision; “It’s also something that is really exciting for humanity you know, just for where we are socially currently we need something huge behind us. I feel sometimes like maybe we’re in a bit of a rut internationally, socially, we seem to be really angry these days, we seem to be always searching for something bigger and this is something huge right, this is something that we can all get behind because this is not just me going to Mars, this is humanity going to Mars.”
For reasons beyond our control, and for an undetermined period of time, our comment section is now closed. However, our social networks remain open to your contributions.