UAE to launch satellite next month under South Korea partnership

Plans for Etihad-Sat latest move in nation's 'ambitious' space exploration programme

The Etihad-Sat is to launch next month, it was announced on Wednesday. Photo: Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed / X

The UAE will launch its latest high-tech satellite next month in partnership with South Korea, marking another significant step forward for the country's growing space sector.

Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed, Crown Prince of Dubai and Deputy Prime Minister, said the development of Etihad-Sat highlighted the nation's soaring ambitions in space exploration.

He said the advanced synthetic aperture radar (SAR) features cutting-edge imaging technology, enabling it to provide high-precision observation in all weather.

Etihad-Sat was built through a partnership between the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre (MBRSC)and South Korea’s Satrec Initiative, a satellite manufacturing company headquartered in the city of Daejeon.

It is scheduled to launch in the first week of March, aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, from the Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, the MBRSC said.

"Our ambitions in the space sector know no bounds, and we firmly believe in the capabilities of our youth to strengthen the UAE’s global leadership in space exploration and help shape a brighter future for humanity, powered by knowledge and innovation," Sheikh Hamdan posted on social media platform X.

The MBRSC said Etihad-Sat represented a "significant milestone" in its satellite development programme, being its first such craft to be equipped with SAR imaging technology.

Hamad Obaid Al Mansoori, chairman of MBRSC, said the development of the satellite was testament to the country's commitment to the space sector.

"Adding a SAR satellite to our fleet expands our ability to provide solutions that support our journey towards a knowledge and innovation-based economy," he said.

Salem Al Marri, director general of MBRSC, said the upcoming launch was "the result of our collaboration with Satrec Initiative as part of a knowledge-transfer programme".

Work on the satellite began two years ago as part of a knowledge transfer programme in collaboration with Satrec Initiative.

The satellite offers three imaging modes: spot mode (high-resolution imaging for small areas), scan mode (wide-area coverage for large regions) and strip mode (extended observation for longer regions).

Reaching for the stars

In January, the UAE's MBZ-Sat, the region’s most advanced Earth-observation satellite, blasted off into space. The 750kg satellite was launched into orbit aboard a Falcon 9 rocket, engineered by Elon Musk’s SpaceX company, from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.

MBZ-Sat, named in honour of President Sheikh Mohamed, was in development by Emirati engineers at MBRSC since 2020, with most of the satellite parts made by private companies.

Amar Vora, head of space at Serco Middle East, a company that provides services and consultancy to the public and private sector, previously told The National that the satellite would provide the highest resolution imagery in the region. Its capabilities exceed those of its predecessor, KhalifaSat.

Meanwhile, the country's Hope probe completed four years in orbit around Mars this month and is continuing to deliver crucial scientific data that is helping researchers to better understand the Red Planet’s atmosphere, weather and potential signs of past life.

On February 9, 2021, the country became the first Arab nation and the fifth worldwide to enter the planet’s orbit with a car-sized spacecraft.

Since then, researchers around the world have been using the probe's data to fill the gaps in understanding Mars’s climate history, atmospheric dynamics and the presence of bio-signature gases that could indicate whether the planet once hosted life.

The mission has also provided unprecedented insights into Martian auroras, weather patterns and one of the planet’s two moons, Deimos.