The United Arab Emirates has announced its plans to set up Mars' first mini city. Photo / Twitter
The United Arab Emirates has announced its plans to set up Mars' first mini city. Photo / Twitter
Having scaled the heights of Earth with the world's tallest building, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has now announced its plans to set up Mars' first mini city.
The UAE said it will build the city by 2117, as part of its 100-year national programme to better understand the red planet.
The announcement was made at the World Government Summit in the presence of representatives of 138 governments.
The energy-rich country on the eastern tip of the Arabian Peninsula announced plans to help get people to the red planet over the few next decades.
The Mars 2117 Project was announced by His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum who is the Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai and His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Abu Dhabi Crown Prince and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces.
"Our aim is that the UAE will spearhead international efforts to make this dream a reality," said Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid.
He said the UAE is ranked among the most important nine countries in the world that invest in space science.
"The UAE has become part of dynamic human scientific efforts to explore space and making scientific contributions to human knowledge," Shaikh Mohammad Bin Zayed said.
"With the launch of this project, we begin a new journey that will last for decades to come, and it will speed up human endeavours to explore other planets,' he added.
The United Arab Emirates has announced its plans to set up Mars' first mini city. Photo / Twitter
The journey to Mars is complicated and many missions have failed.
Countries first trying to launch into space usually fail more often than they succeed and that's just getting into Earth's orbit.
Getting to Mars is the hardest job for even veteran space countries.
The world's overall success rate in Mars missions since the 1960s is less than 50-50. Nasa has the best success rate at around 70 per cent.
It has sent 21 missions to Mars since the 1960s, and all but six have succeeded.
For hundreds of years up until the mid-13th century, Islamic advancements in science and technology experienced a golden age, but later fell behind.
The ruler of the emirate of Abu Dhabi and UAE President Sheik Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nayhan said the Mars probe "represents the Islamic world's entry into the era of space exploration."
The United Arab Emirates has announced its plans to set up Mars' first mini city. Photo / Twitter
Several Muslim-majority nations such as Algeria, Tunisia, Egypt, Turkey Indonesia, Pakistan and Iran already have space agencies or programs.
There have also been several Muslim astronauts from around the world. Saudi-born Prince Sultan bin Salman Al-Saud became the first Muslim and Arab to travel to space in 1985.
Meanwhile, Egypt became the first Arab country to launch its own communications satellite in 1998, dramatically transforming the broadcasting landscape in the region.
