Ambitious Arab mission to explore seven asteroids, including a very red one

Enlarge (credit: Lynette Cook/ W. M. Keck Observatory/ ROOM)

About a year and a half ago, the United Arab Emirates announced an ambitious deep space mission to explore the asteroid belt, with the aim of visiting seven different asteroids.

The Arab country, working with the University of Colorado Boulder, aimed to launch the mission as soon as 2028. It envisioned the probe as a suitable follow-up to the successful launch and flight of the Emirates Mars Mission, which reached orbit around Mars in early 2021 and is continuing to study the red planet’s thin atmosphere and seasonal weather variations.

“The new mission we are mounting to explore the asteroid belt takes us to yet another level of complexity and capability development, and represents a quantum leap forward for the development of the Emirates’ space sector,” Sarah Al Amiri, chair of the UAE Space Agency, said upon announcing the country’s second interplanetary mission.