Bickering in Biosphere 2
Spaceship Earth chronicles fascinating experiment
Do you remember Biosphere 2? No, not Bio-Dome. You’re thinking of the Montreal tourist attraction, or the 1996 Pauly Shore comedy, and I heartily recommend you see the one that didn’t win a Razzie award, just as soon as it’s safe to do so.
Biosphere 2 was a self-sufficient ecological system — complete with mini-ocean, rainforest, veldt, etc. — constructed in the Arizona desert in the late 1980s. In September of 1991, eight “Biospherians” wearing snazzy red jumpsuits that made them look like a doomed-starship landing party sealed themselves inside the huge glass structure for a two-year experiment in closed-system living.
It didn’t go perfectly. One of the crew had to leave for surgery after an injury and returned with some non-food supplies.
The media had a field day with that — as they did when it was revealed that the supposedly all-natural system included a space-age carbon dioxide scrubber, and that even with that the experiment required fresh air to be pumped in to avoid hypoxia among the crew.
But as filmmaker Matt Wolf explains in his well-researched and sympathetic documentary Spaceship Earth, Biosphere 2 was never intended to be some kind of Olympian test of endurance. The crew, along with their charismatic leader John P. Allen and their patron, Texas billionaire Ed Bass, viewed the experiment as a way to test what could or would go wrong.
But the media saw it differently. Wolf ’s film opens by introducing the project and its occupants. But rather than focus entirely on the “mission,” Wolf then rolls the story back 25 years to introduce Allen and his businesses, including the Synergia Ranch in New Mexico, the Institute of Ecotechnics and the Theater of All Possibilities.
We get a taste of the media frenzy over the “bio-nauts,” and self-shot video from inside the experiment, where food shortages and the thinning atmosphere led to some bickering.
But time can’t dim the enthusiasm of the Biospherians, many of whom are interviewed today.
Some would clearly relish a second trip.
Ariel Winter was rushed to hospital recently after accidentally cutting off the top of her thumb while prepping Greek food.
The former Modern Family star opened up to Access Hollywood about the injury, revealing she accidentally nicked an artery with her new kitchen knife, so had no choice other than to seek medical help amid the coronavirus lockdown.
“I was trying to make Greek food because I’m Greek ... and I had chopped four onions just before I chopped this one thing. Chopped four onions and it was great. I just got new knives too,” she said.
“I went to chop a peeled tomato and sliced the top part of my thumb off on a peeled tomato. I was so shocked that it was more like hyperventilating. I was like, ‘I should be crying but I can’t believe it, I can’t believe it’ ... I bled so much, so (my boyfriend and I) had to go to the hospital, and he actually brought the tip of my finger to the hospital.”
After being treated at the hospital, Ariel was given back the severed thumb piece in a plastic bag by one of the nurses, but accidentally threw it out — as she didn’t know what was in there.