The National Space Agency said on Sunday that the UAE probe “Al-Amal” sent its first image of Mars days after it entered its orbit around the red planet.
The picture was taken on Wednesday, a day after the UAE succeeded in placing its probe, called “Amal” in Arabic (Amal in French), around the orbit of Mars, becoming the first Arab country to do such a feat.
“The UAE mission to Mars captured the image of Olympus Mons, the largest volcano in the solar system, appearing in early morning sunlight,” the agency said in a statement.
“The first image of Mars, which was taken by the first Arab probe in history,” wrote Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the Emir of Dubai and the Prime Minister of the State, on Twitter.
The probe is designed to provide a complete picture of the planet’s meteorological dynamics. But above all, it is a step toward a more ambitious goal: to establish a human colony on Mars within 100 years.
Unlike the Chinese Tianwen-1 and American Mars 2020 missions, “Hope” will not land on the Red Planet.
It is scheduled to use three scientific tools to monitor the Martian atmosphere and is expected to start sending information in September, data that scientists around the world will be able to access.
