Emirates Mars Mission "Al-Amal" (Hope) patch.
July 17, 2020
The take-off of the "Al-Amal" probe was postponed twice this week due to unstable weather in Japan.
Image above: The take-off of the "Al-Amal" probe, initially scheduled for Wednesday, should take place Monday Sunday evening around midnight in Switzerland.
The UAE spacecraft "Hope", the first Arab mission to the planet Mars, will be sent to space on July 20 after several reports due to bad weather, announced the Japanese launch company on Friday.
A rich Gulf country, the United Arab Emirates is expected to be the first Arab country to send a probe to Mars. The launch was postponed twice this week due to unstable weather in Japan.
Emirates Mars Mission "Al-Amal" (Hope) probe
The take-off of the "Al-Amal" probe ("Hope" in English or "Espoir" in French), initially scheduled for Wednesday, should take place Monday 6:58 a.m. local time (11:58 p.m. GMT in Switzerland Sunday) from the Tanegashima space center , in southern Japan, said Mitsubishi Heavy Industries.
The Emirates space agency and the Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Center in Dubai, which oversee the project, confirmed Friday the postponement of the launch of the probe to July 20 at 1:58 am, UAE time. "This date may change depending on weather conditions on the island of Tanegashima," added the two institutions on Twitter.
Twit from MBR Space Centre
"Hope" is expected to begin orbiting Mars by February 2021, marking the 50th anniversary of the unification of the seven principalities that make up the United Arab Emirates. Once there, the probe will circle the planet for an entire Martian year of 687 Earth days. The goal is to provide a complete picture of the dynamics of time in the atmosphere of the red planet.
The UAE program is one of three ongoing projects towards the red planet, alongside the Tianwen-1 from China and March 2020 from the United States, which take advantage of the period when Earth and Mars are closest: to barely 55 million km apart, compared to an average of around 76 million km.
Emirates Mars Mission: https://www.emiratesmarsmission.ae/
Images, Text, Credits: AFP/Twitter/MBR Space Centre/Orbiter.ch Aerospace/Roland Berga.
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