After the success of Squid Game, Netflix is back with a new hit TV series from South Korea. And just like the show about children games turned into a fight for survival and 45.6 billion Won, there are plenty of lessons to be learned from The Silent Sea. If you haven’t seen the show yet, be warned that there are plenty of spoilers from this point onwards. Continue reading to know the many The Silent Sea survival lessons you can learn from the spine-tingling series.
What The Silent Sea is All About
The premise of the Korean sci-fi mystery thriller involves a group of doctors, engineers, and soldiers sent on a mission to the moon to retrieve a sample of lunar water. A previous expedition discovered water on the moon, which scientists on the Balhae Lunar station have been experimenting on to see if it’s safe for human consumption. The crew is met with disturbing discoveries that jeopardize their mission and their lives.
Why go through all the trouble? Well, because of desertification. The planet is dying since water has become scarce. In fact, it was so scarce that water distribution was regulated and you had to line up to get your ration using cards.
In this dystopian Earth, pets are not allowed since they also need water to survive. The government is forced to euthanize the animals and keeping pets has become a crime.
The overall goal of the government is to find water for humankind to survive. In fact, this is the main objective of the whole planet as other countries are conducting their own experiments. Suffice to say, there are plenty of survival lessons you can pick up from The Silent Sea.
Heal the Planet
The most important of all The Silent Sea survival lessons you can learn here is to save our planet. The only way to survive in the long term is to heal the planet. And this is what The Silent Sea tries to convey. The Earth no longer has access to clean water and if it’s not clear to you yet, humans need water to survive. Three days without drinking clean water and you’ll go kaput. This is why people are scrambling to find ways to conserve what water is left while also finding new sources.
While the TV series is science fiction, desertification of the entire planet is possible. In fact, we’re well on our way there. Earth is already experiencing a lack of freshwater. In fact, only 3% of the world’s water is freshwater or water that’s safe to drink or bathe in. However, a good portion of that cannot be readily accessed. With how humans are populating the planet, an estimated two-thirds of the world’s population may face water shortages by 2025.
We’ve also experienced plenty of droughts to know that a global level water shortage is something everyone on the planet should be trying to prevent.
Conserve Water
So in order for you and the entire human population to survive, we all need to make a concerted effort to heal the planet. One step involves being mindful of our water consumption. Use less water and not let it go to waste. Take shorter showers. Turn the faucet off while brushing your teeth. Check your pipes for leaks and have them fixed.
We should also recycle water. Clean your car with the bathwater. Use vegetable wash to water your plants. There are plenty of simple ways to conserve water that will contribute in the long run.
Collect rainwater, too. They’re great for cleaning tasks and watering plants that are not for your consumption. It’s not entirely safe to consume since it may contain chemicals, toxins, and germs. Boiling and treating with iodine or chlorine will kill some of the germs but chemicals and toxins will remain. A flush first diverter, meanwhile, will help remove some of the contaminants by getting rid of the initial water in the system.
Filtration also kills some germs and chemicals. Some water filters can remove up to 99.99% of these contaminants so it’s a good idea to own one. There are also portable water filters like LifeStraw Personal Water Filter, Sawyer MINI Water Filtration System, and SaganLife’s Journey Water Filter Bottle.
Stop Polluting the Planet
Pollution is a major problem and it’s robbing all of us of clean water to drink and use. Chemicals used in agriculture, for example, seep into the soil and make groundwater toxic. Garbage, especially plastic trash, and wastewater are dumped into lakes, oceans, and other bodies of water. These make the water unfit for consumption. The only way to truly combat pollution is to stop it at its source. Air pollution also affects the quality of our water resources.
The Silent Sea is a cautionary tale that does its best to depict what can happen if we continue polluting our Earth at its current rate. So think twice before spraying pesticides, using plastic, or flushing trash down the toilet.
Shift to Water-Saving Farm Practices
Water-friendly farming practice like vertical agriculture is one of The Silent Sea survival lessons that help deal with the global water shortage. Vertical farming helps conserve water by 90% compared to traditional farming while also increasing self-sustainability.
The basic idea is that instead of cascading rows of plants across large swaths of (usually arid) land, they are stacked on top of each other to conserve space and water. The different levels don’t need to receive the same amount of sunlight, so we can produce more food with fewer resources. The water that runs through each level of the farm flushes out wastes and washes away pests.
The whole operation is very clean and sustainable, so you get a low-impact yield from all of your invested resources. The best part? The crops take up no extra land space, which leaves more room for other things. Aside from these, vertical farming is energy efficient, chemical-free, and environment-friendly. It also minimizes costs on labor and transportation.
Aquaponics is another sustainable farming system that uses less water than traditional methods. The whole process is a loop – the fish produce nutrients for the plants, which cleanse and filter water for the fish, who eventually dirty it again. The best part? The water needs to be circulated only once a day. The fish waste is a great fertilizer for the plants, and plant residue feeds the fish – it’s a perfect symbiotic relationship.
Other farm practices that conserve water include drip irrigation, smart irrigation scheduling, dry farming, rotational grazing, and growing drought-tolerant crops.
Preparation is Key to Survival
Before embarking on the mission, it’s understood that the crew went on rigorous training to prepare themselves for anything that could happen. While watching the show, however, you get a feeling that they weren’t really that ready.
Well, for one thing, most of the crew were unaware of what really went on in the space station so many years ago. They were, in fact, given false information, which led to some unfortunate incidents.
The previous occupants of the space station supposedly died of radiation some five years beforehand. Then there are the high levels of radiation from the sun, including the solar flares, and galactic cosmic rays.
In one scene, the doctors had to change into hazmat suits, which looked like they were left behind by the previous occupants of the space station. If that’s correct, then they did not bring their own and their spacesuits weren’t completely radiation-proof.
A prepared crew would’ve worn hazmat suits underneath their spacesuits. They could’ve also integrated the radiation-protecting qualities of the hazmat into their spacesuits. Well, the writers can easily argue that radiation-proof space suits are already a thing in this fictional world but why did they have to change into hazmat suits? Better mobility, perhaps? Well, okay. But still…
Spacesuits of today are not completely safe from gamma, x-ray, and particle radiation. The reflective Mylar material, also used to make thermal blankets, offers limited protection from radiation. They’re more effective against UV rays. For now, experts are working on numerous projects to determine the materials that best protect against radiation.
Bring the Proper Gear
If you’re going to war, you need the right weapons. If you’re going to retrieve something from a dark place, you need the right kind of light. Why bring flashlights that you have to hold with one hand to such a dangerous mission in space?
Yes, flashlights are valuable survival tools but bringing handheld ones to a space mission? I mean, c’mon! In this day and age, space suits already have built-in lights. Heck, we also have headlamps and helmets with mounted lights.
In such a potentially dangerous scenario, you want both hands to be free. Having a flashlight, on one hand, is pretty stupid considering there are better options.
Another example that the crew was ill-prepared, at least in terms of equipment, is the lack of extra oxygen cylinders. One of the first trials the group had to endure was to walk from their downed ship to the space station. They had to do so while running out of oxygen and with one of them on the verge of death.
If you’re heading out to space where, you know, there’s little oxygen, you’d want to bring extras, right? The brains behind the mission probably forgot this life-saving fact. Probably the crew lost all their extra cylinders when the Nuri 11 went down. But if you’d think this through, you’d want extra oxygen cylinders attached to your suit, right?
Then there’s the issue of self-defense. In most films set in space, the protagonists had weapons to protect themselves in case they encounter a mass-murdering alien. In The Silent Sea, it seems like not everyone had weapons on them. The mission commander and security team were the only ones who visibly had guns. Also, they only had pistols with them. It appears that they didn’t have bigger guns, which would’ve been better for defending themselves against huge threats.
It’s not also clear but it seems like the two female crew members weren’t trained to handle the weapons. Perhaps they were and we’ll get to see them unload those guns in the next season. In any case, everyone in the mission should have had a weapon and been trained to use them.
Don’t Be Stupid
Stupidity killed the cat… or in this case the astronaut. You discover multiple bodies that died of mysterious circumstances and then here’s this engineer who’s supposed to be one of the best of the best stupidly climbing over a corpse with no face cover whatsoever. He was close enough to give the poor dead guy a kiss, which he almost did when he slipped thus releasing lunar water particles and infecting himself.
Use the Buddy System
Another thing that you can learn from the mistakes of the crewmembers is to not run around all alone in a strange place. Always follow the buddy system. The exact cause of death hasn’t been pinpointed yet at the start and, later on, the co-pilot was violently killed by an unknown being with super strength. These should be enough to convince the crew to stick together. Strength in numbers, remember? And yet, why are some of them still going around on their own?
The world is full of challenges. The mountains bring danger, the oceans are still a big mystery, and space, well, there’s just so much we don’t know about the universe. If we are to explore these places, we need to be prepared more than ever. Our survival depends on it.
The Silent Sea survival lessons learned here are just for starters. There is plenty more to learn not just from the hit Netflix show but from other mediums like movies, survival shows, books, your prepper neighbor, and websites like Gentleman Pirate Club.
