Moon-bound Rashid Rover set for historic lift-off today
UAE’S MISSSION TO LUNAR SURFACE IS A FIRST AMONG ARAB NATIONS
From the desert dunes of the UAE, the Emiratimade Rashid Rover will shoot to the Moon today at 12.39pm (UAE time) aboard a Japanese-made lunar lander that will be sent to space on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida, USA.
The UAE’s historic moonshot is a boon to mankind. The success of the first Emirates Lunar Mission (ELM) will not only make the UAE the first Arab nation and among the first countries in the world to land a rover on the Moon, it will also give the global scientific community more knowledge about Earth’s closest planetary neighbour.
Scientific data, new images
Rashid Rover — named after the late Shaikh Rashid Bin Saeed Al Maktoum, builder of modern Dubai — will help scientists better understand how lunar dust and rocks vary across the Moon. It will collect about 10 gigabytes of recorded material, scientific data and new images of the Moon’s plasma conditions and lunar regolith (blanket of superficial deposits covering solid rocks).
According to Mohammad Bin Rashid Space Centre, the rover will provide fresh data for the development of new technologies that can be used to unravel the origins of our solar system.
Good weather permitting at launch site, Rashid Rover will begin the 385,000-kilometre space journey and land approximately five months from now on Atlas Crater, located on the Moon’s southeastern outer edge of Mare Frigoris (Sea of Cold). From there, it will capture photos and send back to Earth information of the unexplored crater area and the vast basins on Moon’s surface that were formed billions of years ago.
IIn order to reach to the moon in six days, you would need to burn a lot of fuel ... To reduce the cost, ispace selected an approach that takes five months, but burns much less fuel.”
Dr Hamad Al Marzooqi | Project manager
n what is a huge feat ahead of UAE’s 51st National Day, the Emirati-made Rashid Rover is poised to shoot to the Moon, today at 12.39pm (Gulf Standard Time), carrying with it the pride and dreams of the UAE.
From the dunes of Dubai to the soil of the Moon, the lunar rover — named after Shaikh Rashid Bin Saeed Al Maktoum, builder of modern Dubai — will give the global scientific community more knowledge about Earth’s closest neighbour in space.
The rover and lander will lift off aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
Hakuto-R M1, which means ‘white rabbit’ in Japanese, will also carry other payloads, including a transformable lunar robot from Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency; a test module for a solid-state battery from NGK Spark Plug, an artificial intelligence flight computer from Mission Control Space Services, a multiple 360-degree camera from Canadensys Aerospace, a panel engraved with the names of Hakuto crowdfunding supporters, and a music disc containing the song Sorato, played by Japanese rock band Sakanaction.
TWO YEARS AHEAD
His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, first announced Rashid Rover in September 2020, and the original goal was to land it on the Moon by 2024. In April 2021, Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre (MBRSC) signed a contract with ispace, a Japanese private lunar robotic exploration company, to transport Rashid Rover to the Moon aboard the Hakuto-R M1 lander.
Under the terms of agreement, ispace will also provide wired communication and power during the cruise phase and engage in wireless communication on the lunar surface.
AUTOMATED LANDING
SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will take Hakuto-R M1 into the Moon’s orbit, and following successful separation, the lander will use the gravitational pull of the Earth and the sun to guide it to the moon.
As it gets closer to the lunar surface, the lander will first orbit the moon in an increasingly elliptical trajectory before angling itself vertically to perform a fully-automated landing.
Hakuto-R M1 will then establish a steady telecommunication and power supply on the lunar surface to support customer payload’s surface operations, including that of the Rashid Rover.
Rashid Rover will land on Atlas Crater, on the Moon’s southeastern outer edge of Mare Frigoris, and capture photos and collect information about the unexplored crater and the vast basins on the Moon’s surface, formed billions of years ago.
Atlas Crater, for example, has a diameter of 88km, and is believed to have been formed between 3.2 to 3.8 billion years ago. It is circular and bounded by a terraced rim wall. The crater is 2km deep and has a complex floor covered in hills and cracks.
FUEL-SAVING ROUTE
Hakuto-R M1 will take a lowenergy route to the Moon rather than a direct approach. This means the landing will take about five months after launch — April 2023.
Dr Hamad Al Marzooqi, project manager of Emirates Lunar Mission at MBRSC, said: “The main factor is the cost of the mission. In order to reach to the moon within six days — the shortest path — you would need to burn a lot of fuel, which means that you need a big tank and a big propulsion system. In order to reduce the cost, ispace selected an approach that takes five months, but burns much less fuel.
“Therefore the launch cost is lower.”
Dimitra Atri, astrophysicist at New York University in Abu Dhabi, added: “In order to keep the prices of payload delivery attractive to customers, private companies reduce their expenses by choosing the lower cost option, which consumes less energy but takes much longer.”
10GB OF DATA
According to the MBRSC, “The Rashid Rover will provide about 10 gigabytes of recorded material, scientific data and new images to the global scientific community to study the Moon”.
The success of the first Emirates Lunar Mission will make the UAE the first Arab country and among the first countries in the world to land a spacecraft on the Moon, after the US, former Soviet Union and China.
MBRSC said: “The mission embodies the aspirations of the UAE.
“Rashid Rover will collect images and information that will allow the UAE to conduct comprehensive and integrated studies on how to build human settlement on the Moon, prepare for future missions to study Mars and provide the scientific community with answers about the solar system and other planets.”
THE FIRST OF MANY
Rashid Rover is just the first of the UAE’s multiple missions to the Moon.
A couple of months ago, in September, the MBRSC signed an agreement with China National Space Administration to kick-start joint space projects and future lunar exploration.
This includes sending the next UAE rover aboard Chang’e 7, a robotic Chinese lunar exploration mission expected to be launched in 2026 to target the Moon’s south pole.