UAE plans to launch Mars probe tomorrow

The liftoff of United Arab Emirates’ Mars orbiter, postponed due to bad weather, will now be launched on Monday from Japan.

The orbiter named Amal was initially scheduled for Wednesday from the Tanegashima Space Center, has been reset for 6:58 a.m. Monday (2158 GMT Sunday), Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, the provider of the H-IIA rocket, said.

Mitsubishi, however, said there is a slight chance of further postponement depending on the weather. The company has set a launch window through 13th August.

It will take about seven months for the car-sized spacecraft to reach Mars, arriving in February 2021. The spacecraft will then enter orbit, and shortly thereafter begin its mission to study the atmosphere of Mars in May 2021.

The scientific goals of the Hope spacecraft, more broadly known as the Emirates Mars Mission, focus on studying the Martian weather. Billed as the first Martian weather satellite, the spacecraft will monitor weather during a Martian day from an inclined orbit that will afford a variety of views of the surface.

Its orbit will take the spacecraft between 20,000 and 43,000 kilometers above the surface, completing a revolution of the planet once every 55 hours. The UAE says the inclination of the spacecraft, 25 degrees above the Martian equator, is the first of its kind around Mars.

Using its three onboard instruments, the spacecraft will study hydrogen and oxygen present in the upper regions of the Martian atmosphere. It will also aim to see how the Martian weather drives atmospheric loss, which may help explain how the Red Planet lost most of its atmosphere over the last few billion years.

Notably, two other Mars missions are planned in the coming days by the US and China. Japan has its own Martian moon mission planned in 2024.

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