Emirates Lunar Mission 2022 / Rover "Rashid"

[otter]

UAE starts Lunar Mission project, names rover as ‘Rashid’

https://www.gulftoday.ae/news/2020/09/29/uae-starts-lunar-mission-project-names-rover-as-rashid

His Highness Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President, Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, has announced the launch of the Emirates Lunar Mission, the first Emirati and Arab mission to explore the moon.

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The Emirates Lunar Mission is part of the new 2021-2031 strategy launched by the Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Centre, MBRSC, which includes the development and launch of the first Emirati lunar rover named "Rashid," after the late Sheikh Rashid Bin Saeed Al Maktoum, builder of modern Dubai.

The explorer will be designed and built in the UAE by 100 percent Emirati team of engineers, experts, and researchers. If successful, the UAE will become the first Arab country and the fourth country in the world to land on the lunar surface after the United States, Soviet Union, and China. MBRSC will partner with an international entity to assist in landing the Rashid Lunar Rover on the Moon.

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Scientific objectives

The mission aims to conduct tests to study various aspects of the lunar surface, including the lunar soil and its formation and components, thermal properties of the surface including thermal amplitude and conduction characteristics. It will carry out a series of measurements and tests that will expand human understanding of the Moon-plasma, photoelectrons and dust particles located over the illuminated part of the lunar surface. A range of materials will also be tested and their interaction with the Moon will be studied.

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Technical specifications

The Lunar Rover will be equipped with state-of-the-art technologies including a 3D camera, advanced motion system, sensors, communication system and be powered using solar panels.

It will include four cameras that move vertically and horizontally, including two main cameras, a microscope camera, and a thermal imaging camera. Additionally, it will be equipped with sensors and systems to analyse the properties of soil, dust, radioactivity, electrical activities, and rocks on the surface of the Moon.

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Timeline

A team of Emirati engineers, researchers and experts at MBRSC is working towards completing the design of the Lunar Rover by 2021. The rover is set to be manufactured in 2022, while preliminary experiments and tests of the prototype are expected to start in 2023. The Centre aims to launch the Lunar Rover by 2024, setting another record in its growing list of achievements in the space sector.

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[TrevorMonty]

Quick development timeline but realistic if they can draw on Lunar XPrize expertise that is out there.  At 10kg shouldn't have any problem finding space on one of CLPS landers and it won't cost them a future.

[otter]

UAE ramps up space ambitions with Arab world's first Moon mission

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-03054-1

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Rashid will have just one-tenth of the mass of China’s Chang’e-4, the only currently active lunar rover. The UAE craft will include an experiment to study the thermal properties of the Moon’s surface, providing insights into the composition of the lunar landscape. Another experiment will study the makeup and particle size of lunar dust in microscopic detail, says Hamad Al Marzooqi, project manager for the lunar mission at the MBRSC.

Rashid’s most exciting instrument is a Langmuir probe, says Sargeant. A first on the Moon, this will study the plasma of charged particles that hovers at the lunar surface, caused by the streaming solar wind. This environment electrically charges dust in a process that is little understood, she says.

Surface-based experiments to understand the charged environment are essential, because the conditions make lunar dust stick to surfaces, which could be dangerous for future crewed missions, she adds. “It’s really sharp, tiny grains that get everywhere, that stick everywhere and can be hazardous to astronauts if they inhale a lot.”

Rashid will land at an unexplored location at a latitude between 45 degrees North or South of the equator on the Moon’s near side. This allows for easier communication with Earth than would be the case for a far-side probe, and should also mean a landing that is less rocky than one in the Moon’s polar regions. The precise location, however, has yet to be selected from a shortlist of five.

The mission is scheduled to last at least one lunar day — around 14 Earth days — and Rashid could travel anywhere from a few hundred metres to several kilometres. The team is hoping the craft will also last through the equally long lunar night, when the temperature drops to around −173 °C.
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[Star One]

Sounds like a potential customer for Rocket Lab & Electron as they are going very light weight.

[Phil Stooke]

I would expect them to fly as a CLPS payload.  There doesn't seem to be any sign of them building a lander so they will have to fly on another one. 

[Zed_Noir]

 
They could hitch a ride with a tall white spacecraft when said spacecraft conducts Lunar landing trials around that time period.
 

More seriously. Which CLPS providers will have an operational lander by 2024 for the Rashid rover?

[Bean Kenobi]

By 2024, at least 3 :
* Astrobotic Technology (Peregrine lander scheduled for 2021, Griffin lander with Viper rover scheduled for 2023),
* Intuitive Machines (NOVA-C landers scheduled for 2021 and 2022),
* Masten Space (XL-1 lander scheduled for 2022).

[otter]

Moon mission: UAE aims to land Rashid rover on lunar surface by 2022

https://www.thenationalnews.com/uae/science/moon-mission-uae-aims-to-land-rashid-rover-on-lunar-surface-by-2022-1.1203389

The UAE aims to land its Rashid rover on the Moon by hitching a ride on a Japanese mission next year.

The Arab world’s first Moon mission was announced in 2020, with an initial launch date of 2024. Now, the Emirates has unveiled a new partnership to bring its lunar ambitions forward by two years. A deal with Japan's iSpace means the rover will be loaded on board its lander, which will be launched into space aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Kennedy Space Centre, Florida.

The mission was announced by the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre on Wednesday. “This collaboration focuses on delivering the Rashid rover on the lunar service by 2022,” said Adnan Al Rais, Mars 2117 programme director.

Under the agreement, iSpace will also provide wired communication and power during the cruise phase and wireless communication on the lunar surface.

The robotic lunar lander is called Hakuto-Reboot, or Hakuto-R, and is the first one built by iSpace.
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[Blackstar]

Moon mission: UAE aims to land Rashid rover on lunar surface by 2022

https://www.thenationalnews.com/uae/science/moon-mission-uae-aims-to-land-rashid-rover-on-lunar-surface-by-2022-1.1203389

The robotic lunar lander is called Hakuto-Reboot, or Hakuto-R, and is the first one built by iSpace.
/.../

The article has several illustrations.

[FutureSpaceTourist]

https://obj.ca/article/techopia/shining-star-ottawas-mission-control-space-services-soaring-new-heights

Shining star: Ottawa's Mission Control Space Services soaring to new heights

Little Italy-based company's software poised to play key role in historic lunar research effort

Late next year when a vehicle bound for the moon is scheduled to be launched into space on a Falcon 9 rocket from Elon Musk’s SpaceX, a little bit of Ottawa will be hitching a ride.

The Rashid lunar rover is being designed in the United Arab Emirates as part of the Gulf nation’s bid to ramp up its space exploration program. Among its key components is software made right here in Canada’s capital by Mission Control Space Services, a six-year-old startup based in Little Italy that’s now supplying technology to some of Earth’s most cutting-edge companies.

[Yiosie]

ispace Mission 1 with Rashid is now scheduled for launch in October 2022:

U.A.E. examining options for future human spaceflight missions [dated Oct. 28]

Another exploration program underway at MBRSC is the Emirates Lunar Mission, featuring a rover called Rashid. The 15-kilogram rover will be on a commercial lunar lander being built by Japanese company ispace and scheduled for launch in October 2022. The rover will carry a suite of cameras and other instruments, including payloads provided by the French space agency CNES.

A second rover is planned for NET 2024:

MBRSC announced Oct. 27 a memorandum of understanding with Airbus Defence and Space to collaborate on a rover experiment to study how lunar regolith adheres to different materials. AlMarri added that MBRSC is planning a second, more advanced lunar rover that could launch in 2024.

[eeergo]

Rashid at IAC Dubai:

[aurora899]

From 'The National':

UAE's Moon mission on track for October launch

The UAE will attempt to land a rover on the Moon in October, the chief of the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre said on Tuesday.

The Arab world's first Moon mission was announced in 2020, with a launch date set for 2024.

However, the Emirates was able to secure an earlier flight when it partnered with Japan's ispace to use its Hakuto-R lander to deliver the rover to the lunar surface this year.

Salem Al Marri, the director general of the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre, confirmed the rover would launch in October.

“We plan to launch our first rover, which will be the first object from the Arab world to land on another celestial body,” he said.

“We will be landing on the Moon in October of this year.”

Engineers at the UAE space centre are assembling the Rashid rover.

https://www.thenationalnews.com/uae/2022/01/25/uaes-moon-mission-on-track-for-october-launch/

[Phil Stooke]

News on Rashid and the ispace lander it will fly on, from the European Lunar Symposium which just concluded.

Launch late 2022, with landing and surface operations early 2023.  The landing zone is within 7.5 degrees of 45 degrees north.  Other sources have been saying that the landing area was in Lacus Somniorum, just north of Mare Serenitatis, but we learn now that this has changed to one of three backup sites to suit the needs of another customer of ispace.  Details will be released soon.

JAXA will fly a small rover on the same lander - a sphere which will separate into two wheels and a trailing stabilizer bar, with a small camera on top between the wheels.

[Phil Stooke]

(cross-posting)

New landing site identified:

https://www.thenationalnews.com/uae/2022/06/17/uaes-moon-mission-chief-excited-but-feeling-the-pressure-as-rashid-rover-nears-launch/

"The goal is to land in the Atlas crater in the Mare Frigoris site, located in the far-north of the Moon’s near side."

[shiro]

A couple of images of the Rashid Rover before it was integrated into the HAKUTO-R lander.

https://twitter.com/MBRSpaceCentre/status/1587348847386304518/photo/2

[FutureSpaceTourist]

twitter.com/hsajwanization/status/1597482539387846656

Picture of UAE's Rashid Rover, being carried to the lunar surface by ispace's HAKUTO-R Mission 1 lander

https://twitter.com/hsajwanization/status/1597483057095008256

The four-wheel rover, weighing only 10 kilograms, has been built by engineers from the Dubai’s Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre.
A core team of 11 are behind the mission’s development and have been working on it since 2017. @SarwatNasir
https://www.thenationalnews.com/uae/uae-in-space/2022/10/08/rashid-rover-everything-you-need-to-know-about-uaes-moon-mission/

[FutureSpaceTourist]

twitter.com/dcu/status/1597901745572962305

Polymer and metal samples prepared by Dr Susan Kelleher, and members of her team - Dr Graham Reid, Dr James McCormack, and Dr Jessica McFadden - will launch for the moon aboard a new lunar rover to study the way moon dust sticks to different surfaces. Read: https://www.dcu.ie/commsteam/news/2022/nov/samples-made-dcu-lab-aboard-new-lunar-rover-set-launch-moon

https://twitter.com/dcu/status/1597904640732893186

The samples are affixed to the wheel of the Rashid Lunar Rover, designed and constructed by engineers and scientists at @MBRSpaceCentre. The rover will be brought to the moon aboard the HAKUTO-R Mission 1 lunar lander, produced by @ispace_inc. (Image courtesy of @ispace_inc)

[FutureSpaceTourist]

https://twitter.com/hsajwanization/status/1601830946323529728

EXCLUSIVE images of new Mission Control at the UAE Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre @MBRSpaceCentre 😍 (by @SarwatNasir ) #UAEtotheMoon

[FutureSpaceTourist]

twitter.com/mbrspacecentre/status/1601906184516239360

Amer AlSayegh AlGhaferi, Senior Director, Space Engineering Department, MBRSC, addressing the media after the successful launch of the first Emirati mission to the surface of the Moon.

https://twitter.com/mbrspacecentre/status/1601906223850438657

Al-Ghaferi: In two days, we will receive the first signal from the Rashid Rover.

#EmiratesLunarMission
#UAEtotheMoon