UAE’s Mars probe: 'Hope' to be first Arab space mission to reach Red Planet

(Karachi) The first Arab space mission, the UAE's "Hope" probe, is expected to reach Mars' orbit today, making it the first of three spacecraft to arrive at the Red Planet this month, Times of Israel reported.

As per details, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) launched spacecraft, dubbed Hope, in July 2020. After a smooth flight, the spacecraft is expected to land on Mars today. It’s a complex maneuver that requires the spacecraft to complete an intense engine burn with no support from the mission’s engineers, who are left anxiously awaiting bulletins that the solar system’s geometry delays by 10 minutes.

Chairperson of the UAE Space Agency Sarah Al Amiri said, “What that means is 27 minutes of burning fuel, of using our thrusters, of the spacecraft undergoing one of the toughest challenges that it’s been designed for.”

She added, “Youth were being used and radicalized within the region,” she said. “People just wanted opportunities and wanted to be able to apply themselves positively for growth.”

“This is what space is all about; it takes out of it the context of nationality background,” Al Amiri said. “You become a species more than anything else.”

Landing on the Red Planet will allow the Hope team to turn its focus to science while making the UAE the fifth entity to orbit the Red Planet. “The UAE has led the Arab world to new frontiers in deep space for the first time in history,” Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, vice president and prime minister of the UAE and ruler of the Emirate of Dubai, said in a statement.

“Our space mission carries a message of hope and confidence in Arab youth.”

And although Hope is a science mission, the data it will gather has never been the UAE’s top priority. While cementing its status as a key regional player, the UAE also wants the project to serve as a source of inspiration for Arab youth, in a region too often wracked by sectarian conflicts and economic crises.

Hope will use three scientific instruments to monitor the Martian atmosphere, and is expected to begin transmitting information back to Earth in September 2021, with the data available for scientists around the world to study.