[July 16, 2014]DUBAI (Reuters) - The United Arab
Emirates said on Wednesday it planned to send an unmanned probe to Mars
by 2021, in the Arab world’s first mission to another planet.
A UAE Space Agency will be set up to supervise the mission and
develop a space technology industry in the country, a government
statement said. It did not give details such as the cost of the
probe or how it would be designed and built.
“The UAE Mars probe represents the Islamic world’s entry into the
era of space exploration. We will prove that we are capable of
delivering new scientific contributions to humanity,” said UAE
President Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed al-Nahayan.
With a population estimated at no more than about 8 million, most of
whom are foreign workers, the UAE lacks the scientific and
industrial base of the big spacefaring nations.
But it is keen to diversify its economy beyond oil into
high-technology sectors, and its oil reserves give it immense
financial power that it could use to buy expertise. One of the
sovereign wealth funds of Abu Dhabi, the biggest emirate, is
estimated to have assets worth nearly $800 billion.
The UAE's fast-growing airlines, Emirates and Etihad, are among the
world's biggest buyers of planes from U.S. and European aerospace
firms, and a factory in the Abu Dhabi desert now turns out
sophisticated parts for Airbus.
The UAE has invested over $5.4 billion in satellite ventures such as
data and television broadcast company Al Yah Satellite
Communications, mobile communications firm Thuraya and earth mapping
and observation firm Dubai Sat, the government said.
The Mars probe will take nine months to complete the more than 60
million-kilometer (37.5 million-mile) journey to Mars, and will make
the UAE one of only nine countries with space programs exploring the
Red Planet, the statement said.
(Reporting by Andrew Torchia; editing by Andrew Roche)
