Middle East

How the Hope Mars mission will make history in the UAE

Three countries — the UAE, US and China — are embarking on missions this summer, taking advantage of the biennial window when Earth and Mars are closest together. The Emirates Mars Mission, which aims to capture the most comprehensive picture yet of the Red Planet's atmosphere, will be the first of the trio to lift off. With its planned July 15 launch delayed by weather conditions, it is now set to launch from Japan later this week; in doing so, it will make history as the Arab world's first interplanetary mission. "This is the golden age of space in the UAE," explained Fatma Hussain Lootah, manager of the team's instrument science section. "This is the time we decided to stand out in maybe a sector nobody expected us to develop in, because it's knowledge-based, it's very science-based."

New horizons

The UAE's space ambitions are part of a push for economic diversification in a country where oil dominates the economy. The sector accounted for 30 percent of the nation's GDP last year, but the government believes that initiatives like the Emirates Mars Mission will help by encouraging students to explore new subjects."The UAE government wanted to inspire Emirati youth to go into STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) and wanted to use this mission as a catalyst for change in multiple sectors, which includes academic sector, industrial sector and economic sector," said Omran Sharaf, the mission's project manager. To emphasize these intentions, the autonomous spacecraft was named "Al Amal," which translates to "Hope" in English. The team believes this gesture will resonate beyond the UAE. "We all know that we're in a region that has turmoil … so when it was called the Hope probe, it was kind of a symbol of hope, not just for Emirati youth, for the youth of the entire area," said Lootah."And just to give them hope that … this is a new era, this is an era where there's going to be science. There's going to be technology. There is going to be spacecrafts … everything is possible."The Arab world will watch those ambitions take flight when the probe launches from Tanegashima, Japan. Simply making it this far was an impressive feat for the Gulf country. Most Mars missions take between 10 to 12 years to develop, according to Sharaf. But scientists at the Mohammed Bin Rashid SpRead More – Source

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