UAE to send Rashid rover to Moon in November: what is known about the mission?

The UAE is planning to send its first lunar rover, called the Rashid, to the Moon. The mission is scheduled to launch Nov. 9-15, with a more precise date to be known later.

If the mission is successful, the UAE will become the fourth country to land a rover on the surface of the Moon. Before that, the United States, the Soviet Union, and China succeeded.

What is known about the Rashid rover?

Rashid is a four-wheeled lunar rover, which weighs only 10 kg. It has two high-resolution cameras, as well as a microscopic camera, a thermal imager, a probe, and a number of additional technical devices.

Engineers at the Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Center built it. The core team behind the development of the mission consists of only 11 people, and they have been working on the mission since 2017.

The lunar rover is named after the late Sheikh Rashid Al Saeed, the former ruler of Dubai and father of Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid, vice president and ruler of Dubai.

A team of experts has already completed tests of the rover and confirmed that it is ready for its first mission on the surface of the Moon. The experts conducted a series of environmental impact tests - including thermal vacuum tests, vibration resistance tests, and external shock tests.

Rashid Moon rover launch details

The lunar rover, as noted, could launch any day between Nov. 9 and Nov. 15 from Space Force Station 40 at Cape Canaveral in Florida, where the rover will soon be delivered.

Rashid will be launched aboard a Falcon 9 rocket owned by SpaceX and using Japan's Hakuto-R landing module from the Japanese company space.

The missions of Rashid rover

The rover's mission is to study the properties of the lunar soil, the petrography and geology of the Moon, the movement of dust, and the condition of the surface plasma and the lunar photoelectronic envelope.

Lunar dust, or regolith, is one of the main problems astronauts may encounter on the Moon. During the Apollo missions, scientists learned that lunar dust sticks to spacesuits, damaging them, and causing erosion and operational problems.

Space agencies are more determined than ever to send humans to the Moon again, but razor-sharp lunar dust particles remain a serious problem, sticking to almost anything and posing serious dangers.

The Rashid rover can help solve this problem by, among other things, testing various materials against lunar dust. Many test samples of different materials will be attached to the wheels of the rover.

The mission control center in Dubai also expects to receive thousands of images from the Moon rover. One of its cameras is located on top - it will be able to take panoramic images of the robot's surroundings. The rear camera will capture images as the landing module ejects the regolith behind it.

The Rashid mission will last one lunar day, which equals 14 Earth days. The team hopes the lunar rover will be able to survive a lunar night that will also last 14 days, during which temperatures will drop to -183°C.

Other missions to the Moon

Rashid will not be the UAE's only mission to the Moon: work is underway on a long-term lunar exploration program that will include several missions.

Work is also already underway on Rashid 2. China may help launch a rover as part of its Chang'e-7 mission to the South Pole of the Moon in 2026.

NASA's Artemis I lunar mission may also be launched on Nov. 14, with the goal of testing a rocket and the Orion unmanned capsule attached to it in preparation for future missions to the moon with humans on board.