The United Arab Emirates is planning to send an unmanned spacecraft to the moon in 2024 in a project which would make it the fourth nation to reach Earth’s lunar satellite. 

The country’s vice-president and prime minister,  Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, who is also Dubai’s ruler, announced on Tuesday ambitious plans to rapidly expand a space programme that bears his name.

An Emirati space probe is already on its way to Mars, having been launched from Japan’s Tanegashima Space Centre in July. Last year, the UAE also sent its first astronaut to the International Space Station.

Sheikh Mohammed said on Twitter the moon-bound spacecraft will be “an Emirati-made lunar rover that will land on the surface of the moon in 2024 in areas that have no been explored previously by human missions.”

The 22lb rover will study the lunar surface, mobility on the moon’s surface and how different surfaces interact with lunar particles, said the government.

The spacecraft will carry two high-resolution cameras, a microscopic camera, a thermal imagery camera and other devices.

Sheikh Mohammed did not elaborate on which part of the moon UAE scientists plan to explore, or how the rover will be launched into space.

The rover will be named Rashid, after the prime minister’s late father, Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum. Sheikh Rashid was one of the original founding rulers of the UAE, which comprises of seven sheikhdoms on the Arabian Peninsula.

If the venture is successful in 2024, the UAE could become the fourth nation on Earth to land a spacecraft on the moon, following in the footsteps of the US, the Soviet Union and China.

Last year, two more nations attempted to land a spacecraft of the moon. India’s attempt failed and Israel saw its own small spacecraft crash into the lunar surface before touchdown, scuppering its attempt to make history as the first privately funded lunar landing.

The UAE’s probe to Mars, named Amal, or “Hope”, is set to reach the red planet in February next year, when the country celebrates 50 years since its formation.

In September 2021, Amal will start transmitting Martian atmospheric data that will be made available to the international scientific community, said officials.

A successful mission to the moon would mark a major step for the oil-dependent economy, which is hedging its bets on a future in space. The UAE also set the ambitious goal of building a human colony on Mars by 2117.