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UAE@51: From the dunes of Dubai to the soil of the moon, Rashid Rover will make history

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DUBAI: The UAE-made Rashid rover will land on the moon at 12.39pm (GST) on Wednesday, November 30, a colossal feat ahead of the 51st UAE National Day, which carries the The pride and dream of the UAE – and the entire Arab world.

From the desert dunes of the United Arab Emirates to lunar soil, the lunar rover, named after the late Dubai-based builder Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum, will provide humanity and the global scientific community with more about Earth’s recent Knowledge of planetary neighbors.

It will land on the Atlas crater at 47.5°N, 44.4°E on the Mare Frigoris on the southeastern outer edge of the moon, and from there will take pictures and collect images of unexplored cratered regions and vast basins on the moon. photos and information. A surface formed billions of years ago.

20220616 Rasheed Rover

The Rashid rover will study the characteristics of lunar soil, petrology (the composition and properties of lunar rocks), and lunar geology. It will also take pictures of lunar dust movement, surface plasma conditions and lunar regolith (the layer of surface deposits that cover solid rock).
Credit: Virendra Saklani/Gulf News

The UAE’s moonshot program has ambitious goals. According to the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Center (MBRSC), “the Rashid rover will provide the global scientific community with approximately 10 GB of recorded material, scientific data and new images to study the Moon.”

In particular, the Rashid rover will study the characteristics of lunar soil, petrology (the composition and properties of lunar rocks) and lunar geology. It will also take pictures of lunar dust movement, surface plasma conditions and lunar regolith (the layer of surface deposits that cover solid rock).

The Rashid rover will help scientists better understand how lunar dust and rocks change on the Moon. It will also provide new data for the development of new technologies that can be used to reveal the origin of Earth and the solar system.

The success of the UAE’s First Moon Landing Mission (ELM) will make the UAE the first Arab country and one of the first countries in the world to land a spacecraft on the moon after the United States, the former Soviet Union and China.

UAE lunar mission team on Rashid probe 44-1646841192994

The success of the UAE’s First Moon Landing Mission (ELM) will make the UAE the first Arab country and one of the first countries in the world to land a spacecraft on the moon after the United States, the former Soviet Union and China.
Image Credit: Supplied

The MBRSC emphasized: “This mission embodies the UAE’s aspirations. Rashid Rover will collect images and information that will enable the UAE to conduct comprehensive and integrated research on how to establish human settlements on the Moon, prepare for future research missions to Mars, and contribute to the The scientific community provides answers about the solar system and other planets.”

Before we lift off, let’s review the timeline, technical specifications, instruments, features and other important details of the UAE-built Rashid rover.

two years in advance

The Rashid rover was first announced in September 2020 by His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, with the initial aim of sending it to the moon in 2024 .

In April 2021, MBRSC awarded a contract to ispace, inc., a Japanese private lunar exploration robotics company, to deliver the Rashid Rover to the Moon using the Hakuto-R M1 (Mission 1) lander. Under the terms of the agreement, ispace will also provide wired communications and power during the cruise phase and wireless communications on the lunar surface.

launch date

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will lift off from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral, Florida, USA, at 12:39 p.m. GST on Wednesday, November 30. But the date and time are subject to change, depending on weather and other conditions at the time of the launch, according to MBRSC.

Hakuto-R M1, which means “white rabbit” in Japanese (according to Japanese folklore, white rabbits are said to live on the moon), will also carry other payloads, including a transformable lunar robot from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency; NGK A solid-state battery test module from Spark Plug Co., Ltd., an artificial intelligence (AI) flight computer from Mission Control Space Services Inc., a multi-360-degree camera from Canadensys Aerospace, engraved with the names of Hakuto’s crowdfunding supporters, and a sheet containing Music CD of the song “Sorato” performed by the Japanese rock group Sakanaction.

Fuel saving route

Once launched, the integrated spacecraft Hakuto-R M1, which will carry the Rashid rover and other payloads to the moon, will take a low-energy route to the moon rather than a direct approach. That means it will take about five months to land on the moon after launch in April 2023.

Dr Hamad Al Marzooqi, project manager for the UAE lunar mission at MBRSC, told Gulf News the rationale for the fuel-efficient but long-distance route. He said: “The main factor is the cost of the mission. The cost comes from the size and mass of the spacecraft. To get to the moon in six days – the shortest path – you need to burn a lot of fuel, which means you need a big fuel tank and A big propulsion system to do that.”

“But this will have a huge impact on cost, so to reduce the cost of the mission, ispace (our partners) chose a method where they can reach the surface of the moon in five months, but it will cost less because it will burn more Less fuel. They will use smaller fuel tanks and propulsion systems, so the launch cost and the cost of developing the development system will be lower,” he further explained.

Dimitra Atri, an astrophysicist at NYU Abu Dhabi, added: “To keep the price of payload delivery attractive to customers, private companies reduce expenses by choosing lower-cost options that use less energy. But it will take longer.”

fully automatic landing

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will launch Hakuto-R M1 into lunar orbit, and after successful separation from the launch vehicle (rocket), Hakuto-R M1 will use the gravity of the Earth and the sun to guide it to the moon.

As it gets closer to the lunar surface, the Japanese-made lander will first circle the moon in an increasingly elliptical orbit, then tilt vertically to soft-land on the moon and perform a fully automatic landing.

SpaceX Falcon-9 rocket on Starlink mission

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will launch Hakuto-R M1 into lunar orbit.
Image credit: Associated Press

The landing of Hakuto-R M1 will establish a stable telecommunications and power supply on the lunar surface to support ground operations of customer payloads, including the UAE’s Rashid rover.

landing point

The MBRSC identified Atlas Crater, located at 47.5°N, 44.4°E on the Moon’s southeastern outer edge of the Mare Cold (“Mare Cold”), as the landing site for the Rashid probe.

MBRSC explained: “It was chosen to allow flexibility during operations. Mare Frigoris is located in the far northern part of the Moon. The primary landing site was chosen along with multiple contingencies that could have been rejected depending on variables that occurred during transport.” Use. The site meets the technical specifications for the Lander Technology Demonstration mission and the scientific exploration goals for the ELM mission.”

Mohammed bin Rashid Space Center (MBRSC)

Mohammad bin Rashid Center.
Image Credit: Supplied

Atlas Crater is 88 kilometers in diameter and is believed to have formed between 320 and 3.8 billion years ago. It is circular and surrounded by intricately stepped edge walls. The crater is 2 kilometers deep and has a complex surface of hills and fissures.

According to ispace, in addition to Atlas Crater, other landing targets include Lake of Dreams, Iridium Sinus and Sea of ​​Storms, among others.

compact rover

The Rashid Rover was entirely designed and developed by the UAE team and is billed as the most compact lunar rover in the world. It has a height of 70 cm, a length of 50 cm and a width of 50 cm. It weighs around 10kg (including payload), but it can climb over obstacles up to 10cm high and descend slopes up to 20 degrees.

With deliveries of the Rashid Rover well ahead of the original 2024 deadline, building it required rapid prototyping. According to Al Marqoozi, engineers at MBRSC “went through five modules until they completed one module”, which will be launched on November 30.

advanced camera

The four-wheeled Rashid Rover has 3D cameras, an advanced motion system, sensors and a communication system powered by solar panels.There are four cameras that can move vertically and horizontally, two of the main cameras are Caspex (cameras used in space exploration) to withstand vibration during launch and landing

The two Caspex were developed by MBRSC in cooperation with the French space agency CNES (National Center for Space Research) to analyze the properties of lunar soil, dust, radioactivity, electrical activity and rocks on the lunar surface. A Caspex is mounted on top of the rover’s mast to provide panoramic visibility of its surroundings, while a rear-mounted CASPEX camera will provide high-resolution images of lunar soil.

“The drive track of the Rashid Rover will be analyzed to determine wheel sinkage and study detailed wheel-soil interactions. This data will be important for designing the mobility systems of future rovers,” MBRSC noted.

mission period

The Rashid rover will study the lunar environment for a month, the equivalent of 14 days on Earth. But it is possible that Rashid Rover’s mission will be extended to another lunar day. Al Marzooqi explained earlier: “After the first lunar day, the rover will go into hibernation or mode sleep for (moon) nights (also equivalent to 14 Earth nights) until the sun rises again and the rover’s surface Temperatures in the U.S. have started to rise again. At that point, the team will try to “wake up” the Rashid rover to see if its systems can survive the low temperatures and get ready for the second lunar day.

However, the moon’s environment is very harsh. When sunlight hits the lunar surface, temperatures drop from as high as 127 degrees Celsius to minus 173 degrees Celsius. But the Rashid rover is equipped with the latest technology that can withstand the temperature of the lunar surface.

go to the moon and come back

The Rashid rover will not return to Earth. It was a one-way flight and there was no transport to bring back Rashid Rover and Hakuto-R. What the Rasheed rover will bring back to Earth are multiple images — approximately 10 gigabytes of recorded material and scientific data. MBRSC’s ELM team will use these to test new technologies in materials science, robotics, mobility, navigation and communications. The findings will also help design future missions to survive and operate in the harsh space environment.

The Rashid rover is only the first of many UAE missions to the moon. A few months ago, in September, MBRSC signed an agreement with the China National Space Administration (CNSA) to launch joint space programs and future lunar exploration, including sending the next UAE rover on Chang’e-7, which is China’s hopeful lunar exploration mission is due to launch in 2026, targeting the lunar south pole.

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