Keep an eye out for the tougher phase as it enters the Mars Orbit
4 possible scenarios for the "Hope Probe"
The team took into account all possible scenarios.
Archives
Engineer Imran Sharaf: Director of the Emirates Mars Exploration Project "The Hope Probe"
picture
The Emirates Mars Exploration Project announced that the "Hope Probe" has successfully completed the third stage of its historic journey to explore the Red Planet, which is "navigation in space", which lasted about seven months.
This is the longest of the six phases of the first space mission led by an Arab country to explore the planets.
The stage of "space navigation" began after the end of the launch and early operations phases. The average speed of the probe was about 121 thousand kilometers per hour, and it witnessed three major maneuvers to direct the path so that it was on its correct path towards the orbit of Mars.
After successfully completing the stage of space navigation, the "probe of hope" begins the stage of entering Mars, which is the most difficult and dangerous stage of the space mission, and it takes 27 minutes before the probe successfully reaches its specific orbit around the red planet.
The probe faces four main scenarios at this stage, three of which are successful, and the fourth may mean the probe is lost or destroyed in space.
Programming that determines the fate of the probe
The difficulty of this stage lies in the fact that the connection is temporarily disconnected from the probe, which operates all this time on its own, as its success is entirely dependent on the programming operations previously undertaken by the work team when building and designing the probe, which is difficult to try in similar conditions on the planet. This stage, the work team focuses on inserting the "Probe of Hope" into the capture orbit around Mars safely. In order to complete this mission successfully, half of the fuel in the probe tanks will be burned, to slow it down to the extent that it is allowed to enter the capture orbit, and the fuel burning process continues. Using six reversible (delta V) motors for 27 minutes, the probe is designed for this stage to be self-propelled.
After the successful completion of this process, all scientific systems and devices on board the probe will be re-examined and tested, before moving to the scientific stage during which the first contact of the probe with the earth station will be made through the deep space monitoring network, through its main station in the Spanish capital, Madrid.
Space is fraught with danger
The director of the Emirates Mars Exploration Project, "The Hope Probe", Eng. Omran Sharaf, stressed that planetary exploration projects are always fraught with challenges and risks, especially the missions of Mars exploration, as the challenges of sending a satellite to the Red Planet are five times the same as doing the same mission around Earth.
Sharaf said that the team of the Emirates Mars Exploration Project studied all potential challenges - the main and subsidiary - that the Hope Probe could face in its journey to explore Mars, and all these possibilities were taken into account when designing, building and programming the probe to help it overcome them, but this does not prevent Exposure to any emergency conditions that may affect the flight schedule or its chances of success, especially in the stage of entering the capture orbit around Mars, which is the most difficult stage of the probe's journey.
"The 27 Blind Minutes"
He explained that the probe must reduce its speed, which is 121,000 kilometers per hour, to 18,000 kilometers per hour, within just 27 minutes.
The biggest challenge in these minutes, which is called the "27 blind minutes", is the lack of control of the Al Khawaneej Center in Dubai over the probe during them, because the probe handles the challenges it faces in it by itself.
If more than two of the reversing propulsion motors failed, this would cause the probe to become lost in deep space and cannot be recovered.
Sharaf added that if the "Hope Probe" was able to successfully enter the orbit of Mars, the UAE would be the fifth in human history to reach the red planet.
This confirms the size of the achievement, especially since the success rate of reaching orbit historically does not exceed 50%.
Mission scenarios
Sharaf identified four main scenarios for the process of entering the "Probe of Hope" into the capture orbit around Mars, in addition to many sub-possibilities within each scenario, indicating that "three of the scenarios will crown the mission of the probe with success."
He explained that the first scenario, which the project team worked on preparing for throughout the past years of the project's life, is that the probe successfully enters the capture orbit by self-lowering its speed from 121,000 km to 18,000 km during the 27 blind minutes, during which there is a delay in communication. About 11 minutes with the ground control center in Dubai, through the work of the reverse propulsion devices that the work team has programmed in advance to do this task independently, without human intervention, and then the probe will enter safely, and on time according to the schedule, into the orbit of Mars, And this stage has been crowned with success.
The second scenario is the loss of one or two reverse thrust engines, which will result in an increase in the time required to reach the probe, and thus a slight delay in ensuring that this stage is completed successfully.
As for the third scenario, which we do not wish to happen, it is the failure of more than two of the probe's six reverse propulsion engines, and the failure of the process of entering the capture orbit, which could result in the probe being destroyed after colliding with Mars, or for it to bypass the red planet and get lost in space.
The fourth and final possibility is that the probe will successfully reach the capture orbit around Mars, with the loss of permanent contact with it, explaining that "this will be considered a partial success of the probe mission by reaching this advanced stage."
Sharaf stressed that "despite the possibility of any of the previous scenarios or others, the project team had worked on developing alternative plans in the development and programming stages of the probe, and therefore we are confident that the team's efforts over the past years will be crowned with success."
Completion of 3 stages
The Al-Amal probe had successfully completed three stages in its historic first mission of its kind, since its launch from the Tanegashima Space Center in Japan on board the H2A missile on July 20, 2020 at 01:58 am UAE time, which are: the launch phase and the operations phase Early, space navigation phase.
And the probe remains in front of three other stages, which are entering Mars, moving to the scientific orbit, and then the scientific stage during which it will, through its scientific equipment, collect and send data about the red planet.
Each of these stages has its own risks, nature, and specific challenges that require dealing with them with precision, efficiency and skill on the part of the work team.
It is noteworthy that the "Hope Probe" has successfully overcome a number of challenges since its inception in 2014, the most prominent of which was the circumstances imposed by the Corona pandemic around the world, as the team was able to transfer it from Dubai to Japan, and successfully launched it from Tangashima base.
The Hope Probe took six years to develop, while similar Mars missions took 10 to 12 years.
The project was also completed at half the usual cost of other scientific projects to Mars, as the cost amounted to 200 million dollars, and is among the lowest in the world in comparison to similar missions and projects, thanks to the efforts of the national engineering, research and scientific cadres.
The UAE Mars Exploration Project is the first Arab project to study the Red Planet, and the "Hope Probe" is the focus of the hopes of hundreds of millions from 56 countries (Arab and Islamic).
It is an ambitious project to register an honorable Arab scientific and research presence in the field of Mars exploration.
Upon the successful arrival of the "Probe of Hope" to Mars orbit, the UAE will be the fifth country in the world to achieve this historic achievement, as part of its qualitative scientific project to explore Mars.
The project serves humanity in general, and the scientific community in particular, and puts the information it collects through its research on Mars, free of charge, within the reach of more than 200 scientific institutions and research centers around the world.
The Emirates Mars Exploration Project also establishes the interest of the country's youth and the Arab world to study science, mathematics, engineering and technology, and specialize in them.
The project contributes to building highly qualified Emirati cadres in the field of space technology, innovation, and scientific and space research.
It also contributes to fundamental transformations in developing the capabilities of the UAE and the Arab world in the field of engineering, industrial, scientific and research infrastructures.
The arrival of the "Hope Probe" to the orbit of Mars coincides with the UAE celebrations of the 50th National Day for the proclamation of the union.
Imran Sharaf:
- "We took into account all the possibilities when designing, building and programming the probe and its scientific systems and equipment."
- "The challenges of sending a satellite to Mars are equivalent to 5 times the same mission around Earth."
Historically, the success rate of space missions aimed at exploring the Red Planet is 50%.
- Two countries arrived at Mars from the first attempt ... and the third Emirates if the "Hope Probe" was successful.
The probe has accomplished 3 stages of its mission, namely "launch", "early operations" and "navigation in space."
The difficulty of entering Mars' orbit lies in slowing the probe, its speed, from 121,000 km to 18,000 km per hour.
Follow our latest local and sports news, and the latest political and economic developments via Google news