UAE extends mission of its Al-Amal Mars orbiter
Al-Amal’s 2023 image of Deimos, the first good
picture of the moon ever taken. Click for full movie.
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) yesterday announced it is extending the mission of its Al-Amal Mars orbiter (“Hope” in English) to 2028, significantly beyond its initial planned mission of two years.
Launched in July 2020, the Hope Probe successfully entered Mars orbit in February 2021 after a seven-month interplanetary journey, marking a historic achievement as the first Arab nation to reach the Red Planet. Originally designed as a two-year mission to observe and study Mars’ atmosphere, the probe has far exceeded expectations. Since reaching Mars, it has gathered around 10 terabytes of scientific data, shared through more than a dozen datasets with research institutions worldwide.
The probe itself was mostly built by American engineers and organizations, as part of a deal to train UAE students. Once in operation around Mars, the UAE and those students took over almost all operations. It orbits Mars in a very wide orbit, allowing it to study global weather and atmosphere conditions, such as dust storms.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Al-Amal’s 2023 image of Deimos, the first good
picture of the moon ever taken. Click for full movie.
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) yesterday announced it is extending the mission of its Al-Amal Mars orbiter (“Hope” in English) to 2028, significantly beyond its initial planned mission of two years.
Launched in July 2020, the Hope Probe successfully entered Mars orbit in February 2021 after a seven-month interplanetary journey, marking a historic achievement as the first Arab nation to reach the Red Planet. Originally designed as a two-year mission to observe and study Mars’ atmosphere, the probe has far exceeded expectations. Since reaching Mars, it has gathered around 10 terabytes of scientific data, shared through more than a dozen datasets with research institutions worldwide.
The probe itself was mostly built by American engineers and organizations, as part of a deal to train UAE students. Once in operation around Mars, the UAE and those students took over almost all operations. It orbits Mars in a very wide orbit, allowing it to study global weather and atmosphere conditions, such as dust storms.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Beautiful images of Deimos. Thank you for posting them. Oddly, I had never seen these in such expected places as Sky & Telescope, especially — as you say — they give us our first really good look at this tiny moon.
That’s a really spectacular photo of Deimos — I had never seen that before!
Richard M: Actually, this image is a repost from my 2023 post, when I reported its publication, when it happened. If you hadn’t seen it before its because you hadn’t been looking in the right places at that time. :)
Hello Bob,
Well, don’t I feel sheepish? Obviously, I missed it at the time, alas… I can only plead that I wasn’t surfing here as often in 2023 as I am now!
I am glad I have seen it now, either way. The UAE may not have built this thing, but I am glad that they paid for it, because if nothing else, we wouldn’t have that amazing sequence of shots of Deimos otherwise. (There are other reasons, too, of course, as your post makes clear.)
I hope the UAE continues to spend more on space.
Jeff Wright:
UAE is a not yet a playa in space, but they are looking to be. A successful mission to Mars, and an attempt to land a rover on the Moon: but the delivery system, didn’t. They have an asteroid mission upcoming, and another Lunar rover attempt; this time with an American lander. The UAE seems very much planning to spend more on space.
https://space.gov.ae/en