The first Arab space mission, the UAE’s “Hope” probe, is expected to reach Mars orbit on Tuesday, making it the first of three spacecraft to reach the Red Planet this month.
The United Arab Emirates, China and the United States launched projects to Mars in July last year, taking advantage of a time when Earth and Mars are closest.
If successful, the wealthy Gulf state will become the fifth country to ever reach Mars – a campaign to mark the 50th anniversary of UAE union – with China’s intention to become the sixth day the next day. .
Landmarks across the UAE were lit up in red at night, government accounts decorated with the hashtag #ArabstoMars, and on the big day Burj Khalifa in Dubai, the tallest tower in the world, will be at center of celebration ceremony. “Hope”, known as “Al-Amal” in Arabic, orbits the planet for at least one Martian year, or 687 days, while the Tianwen-1 comes from China and the permanent rover- Mars 2020 stability from the US to land on Mars’ surface.
Only the USA, India, the former Soviet Union and the European Space Agency have previously reached the Red Planet.
Following an explosion out of Japan in July last year, Hope’s mission is now facing its “most urgent and complex” move, according to Emirati officials, with a 50-50 chance to go successfully entered Mars orbit.
The spacecraft will have to slow down in order to be captured by Martian gravity, turning and firing its six Delta-V missiles for 27 minutes to its orbit of 121,000 kilometers (about 75,000 miles) in the time reduced to about 18,000 kph.
The process, which will consume half of its fuel, will begin Tuesday at 1530 GMT and will take 11 minutes to signal its progress in taking control of the land.
Omran Sharaf, UAE mission project manager, said it was a “huge honor” to be the first of this year’s missions to reach Mars.
“It’s a shame to be in such a prestigious and skilled company as we all embark on our missions,” he said. “It has never been a race for us. We come to space as a collaborative and inclusive endeavor. “
While the Hope probe is designed to provide a broad image of the planet’s weather dynamics, it is also a step towards a much more ambitious goal – building a human settlement on Mars within 100 year.
While consolidating its status as a key regional player, the UAE also wants the project to be a source of inspiration for Arab youth, in an area that is too often plagued by sectarian conflict and economic crisis. .
Hope will use three scientific instruments to monitor the Martian atmosphere, and is expected to begin spreading information back to Earth in September 2021, with the data available for scientists around the world to study.
China Tianwen-1, or “Questions to Heaven”, has already restored the first image of Mars – a black-and-white image that showed geological features including the Schiaparelli crater and the Valles Marineris, a large piece of canyons on the Martian Surface.
The five-tonne Tianwen-1 includes a Mars orbiter, a solar-powered lander and rover that will for three months explore the planet’s soil and atmosphere, take photographs, map maps and view for signs of a past life.
China hopes to land the 240-kilogram rover in May in Utopia, a major impact center on Mars. Its orbiter will last for a Martian year.
Tianwen-1 is not the first attempt in China to reach Mars. A previous mission with Russia in 2011 ended prematurely when the launch failed. NASA’s permanence, which is expected to hit the Red Planet on Feb. 18, is the fifth rover to complete the orbit since 1997 – and they’ve all been American.
He is on an astrobiology mission to look for signs of an old microbial life and will try to fly a 1.8 kilogram helicopter drone on another world for the first time. Persistence, capable of automatically navigating 200 meters (650 feet) per day, gathers rock samples that could provide valuable evidence for the existence of life on Mars.
