Sheikh Hamdan congratulates leadership, people on success of SIRIUS-21 space mission

Dubai: Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince and Chairman of the Executive Council, congratulated the UAE leadership and people on the success of SIRIUS-21, the first UAE analog astronaut mission at the NEK ground-based analog facility in Moscow, Russia.

The 240-day isolation experiment kicked off on November 4, 2021, with the participation of UAE astronaut Saleh Al Ameri along with Russian and American astronauts.

“The success of the SIRIUS-21 mission is a new achievement added to the UAE and the team of the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre,” Sheikh Hamdan said on his twitter account.

Five members of the SIRIUS-21 crew on Sunday left the terrestrial experimental centre of the Russian Institute of Medical and Biological Problems after 240 days in isolation.

“The SIRIUS-21 space study ends on July 3, at 13.00 pm. Five members of the international crew including three men and two women) spent 240 hours within its framework in the environment simulating operation of a real space expedition at a near-Moon orbital station and the Moon’s surface. The crew will leave ‘the spacecraft’ and return to the Earth,” the institute said in a statement.

Researcher-volunteers from Russia, the US and the UAE staged more than 70 experiments during the study in various areas, such as psychology, psychophysiology, physiology, sanitary hygiene, microbiology, biochemistry and so on. Furthermore, the crew performed moon-landing operations, moonwalk and rover control.

The SIRIUS-21 study is the third milestone of the SIRIUS (Scientific International Research in Unique terrestrial Station) international project. The project provides for a series of isolation studies. The next experiment to simulate the long-range space flight will last for a year and will begin in July 2023.