UAE At Mars

The UAE made history on Tuesday evening, Feb.9, as the first Arab nation, and the fifth in the world, to reach Mars after the Hope Probe successfully entered the Red Planet’s orbit at 7.42pm.

On its first day in Mars, the team restored communication with the probe to ensure its systems remained intact after the dangerous phase it had just passed. For the next 3-4 weeks, daily contact will be scheduled between the probe and the team back on Earth, enabling a quick turn-around of command sequence uploads and telemetry receipt. The probe will capture its first picture of Mars in the first week of its arrival.

After a period of testing and validation, a series of manoeuvres are performed to get the Hope Probe in the correct position to move into the Science Orbit.

The mission will provide deeper insights on the climatic dynamics of the Red Planet through observing the weather phenomena in Mars such as the massive famous dust storms that have been known to engulf the Red Planet, as compared to the short and localized dust storms on earth. It will focus on better understanding the link between weather changes in Mars’ lower atmosphere, with the loss of hydrogen and oxygen from the upper layers of the atmosphere.

UAE President His Highness Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan congratulated UAE citizens and residents and people of the wider region for the success of the UAE’s Hope Probe arrival to Mars in the first-ever Arab interplanetary mission that marks the Arab world’s entry in the global race of space exploration.

The UAE made history on Tuesday evening, Feb.9, as the first Arab nation, and the fifth in the world, to reach Mars after the Hope Probe successfully entered the Red Planet’s orbit on, at 7.42pm.