The new space race is a mixture of technology companies and governments. Elon Musk through SpaceX has been working on sending people to Mars.
In 2015 Amazon’s billionaire CEO Jeff Bezos announced an ambitious plan to enter the private space race. Jeff Bezos’ vision (Blue Vision) is to go to space to tap its unlimited resources and energy. This would be done through lowering the cost of access to space with reusable launch vehicles.
Richard Branson’s Virgin Orbit reached space in January 2021, eight months after the first demonstration flight of its air-launched rocket system failed.
Russian space launchers flew 17 missions in 2020, taking a distant third place after the US and Chinese rockets, but notably, without accidents for the second year in a row.
Fast forward to February 2021, United Arab Emirates seeks to place a probe around Mars.
The Hope spacecraft, launched from Earth seven months ago, is about to reach the decisive moment in its long journey – orbit insertion.
Currently moving at over 120,000km/h (75,000mph), it must fire its braking engines for 27 minutes to be sure of being captured by the planet’s gravity.
Success would enable Hope to begin its mission to study Mars’ climate.
“We’re entering a very critical phase,” said project director, Omran Sharaf. “It’s a phase that basically defines whether we reach Mars, or not; and whether we’ll be able to conduct our science, or not