By Mari Yamaguchi
The liftoff of the United Arab Emirates' Mars orbiter was postponed until Friday due to bad weather at the Japanese launch site.
The orbiter named Amal, or Hope, is the Arab world's first interplanetary mission. The launch was scheduled for Wednesday from the Tanegashima Space Center in southern Japan, but the UAE mission team announced the rescheduled date on Twitter.
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries' H-IIA rocket will carry UAE's craft into space. Mitsubishi launch official Keiji Suzuki had said on Monday a postponement was possible as intermittent lightning and rain were forecast over the next few days.
Heavy rain has fallen for more than a week in large areas of Japan, triggering mudslides and floods and killing more than 70 people, most of them on the southern main island of Kyushu.
Hope is set to reach Mars in February 2021, the year the UAE celebrates 50 years since its formation. A successful Hope mission would be a major step for the oil-dependent economy seeking a future in space.
Hope carries three instruments to study the upper atmosphere and monitor climate change and is scheduled to circle the red planet for at least two years.
Emirates Mars Mission Project Director Omran Sharaf, who joined Monday’s briefing from Dubai, said the mission will provide a complete view of the Martian atmosphere during different seasons for the first time.
Two other Mars missions are planned in the coming days by the U.S. and China. Japan has its own Martian moon mission planned in 2024.
Clive McCoy, director of tourism for the British Virgin Islands, joined Cheddar to discuss how the territory was relaxing restrictions for travel to resume back to the tropical getaway.
While much of the world remains hunkered down, the band Six60 has been playing to huge crowds in New Zealand, where social distancing isn’t required after the nation stamped out the coronavirus.
The charitable arm of San Francisco-based technology giant Cisco Systems has pledged to invest $100 million over the next decade to help reverse the impact of climate change.
The White House says the U.S. will begin sharing its entire stock of AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines with the world once it clears federal safety reviews.
Officials say the European Union is finalizing plans to allow tourists from the United States to travel to the 27-nation bloc this summer.
Jill is joined by Baker Machado this morning to talk about the CDC reinstating the J&J vaccine, a worsening Coronavirus crisis in India, but also, where things are looking a lot better.
Michigan has become the current national hotspot for COVID-19 infections and hospitalizations at a time when more than half the U.S. adult population has been vaccinated and other states have seen the virus diminish substantially.
A U.S. health panel says it’s time to resume use of Johnson & Johnson’s COVID-19 vaccine, despite a very rare risk of blood clots.
A growing coalition of private companies, nonprofits, and the federal government are pushing for a more unified approach towards COVID vaccination credentialing.
World leaders have joined President Joe Biden at a virtual climate summit to share their stories about how nations can break free of climate-damaging fossil fuels.
