‘Space analogues” on Earth
In 1965 and 1967 NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey organised field trips to Iceland for American astronauts to learn geology in locations described as ‘terrestrial analogue sites’. Also called ‘space analogues’, they are places on Earth with assumed past or present geological, environmental or biological conditions of a celestial body such as the Moon or Mars.
Described as “Probably the most moon-like of the field areas”, in a NASA document that acts as a ‘field training schedule’, the environments found in Iceland would have provided astronauts with the means to apply their practical knowledge of geology to validate their findings on the moon.
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