ABU DHABI // The UAE Space Agency is planning to honour the country’s martyrs by sending their names into space later this year.
The agency aims to send every martyr’s name and the date and the place of their deaths to the International Space Station, stitched into badges featuring a commemoration day logo.
Once returned to Earth, the badges will be presented to the families of the martyrs.
The initiative is an example of the country’s unity with its people, said Abdallah Al Bastaki, whose father was killed in a terrorist attack last month.
“My family and I are honoured and it’s a very noble idea,” said the eldest son of Mohammed Ali Zainal Al Bastaki, one of the five Emiratis killed while on a humanitarian mission in Afghanistan in January.
“Sending the names to space is a gesture of goodwill and solidarity with the people who lost loved ones.”
With the motto “Our martyrs are stars that light space and we will not forget their sacrifice”, the project is designed to recognise the sacrifice made by the country’s martyrs.
“With 2017 being the Year of Giving we wanted to give back to the relatives of those who gave their country the ultimate sacrifice,” said Sheikha Al Maskari, the agency’s chief innovation officer.
“It is important for us to recognise our martyrs and what they have done to protect our country.”
The agency’s gesture is one of the many ways the government and community have shown continuous support for the martyrs’ families, said Mr Al Bastaki.
“We still have people coming to our home every day, with 28 recently visiting us in one day,” he said.
“They are torn between mourning and congratulating us for our father’s death.”
Mr Al Bastaki said he had seen an outpouring of giving by the community since the death of his father, something he hoped would continue for years to come.
“The space agency’s plan shows how the UAE is a country of giving and we hope this perpetuates, here and around the world,” he said.
Ms Maskari said a secondary outcome of the project could be the raising of the public’s awareness of the country’s achievements and ambitions in space.
“We have seen a lot of interest in the flag that was brought back from the moon by the public. People were very excited by the fact it had been in space,” she said.
In 2015, the United States gifted the UAE Space Agency a US flag that was carried on board the Apollo 14 mission to the moon in 1971 as a token of support for the UAE’s fledging space programme.
talsubaihi@thenational.ae
