Saudi Arabia will send its first-ever female astronaut on a space mission later this year, according to official media, in an effort to change the kingdom’s ultraconservative reputation.
Rayyana Barnawi will accompany male Saudi astronaut Ali Al-Qarni on a voyage to the International Space Station (ISS) “during the second quarter of 2023,” according to the Saudi Press Agency.
The agency said that the astronauts “will join the crew of the AX-2 space mission” and that the space trip would “launch from the USA”
The oil-rich nation will follow in the footsteps of the United Arab Emirates, which in 2019 became the first Arab nation to launch a citizen into space.
The astronaut Hazzaa al-Mansoori spent eight days on the ISS at the time. Later this month, another Emirati, Sultan al-Neyadi, will go on a journey.
Neyadi, 41, will become the first Arab astronaut to spend six months in orbit when he launches on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket towards the International Space Station.
Through a variety of initiatives, Gulf monarchs have sought to diversify their energy-dependent economies.
Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia, has also been attempting to shed the kingdom’s reputation of austerity by pushing for changes.
Since his ascent to power in 2017, women have been permitted to drive and go abroad without a male guardian, and their percentage in the labour market has more than quadrupled from 17% to 37% since 2016.
Saudi Arabia’s foray into space is hardly the first, though.
In 1985, Saudi royal Prince Sultan bin Salman bin Abdulaziz, an airforce pilot, took part in a US-organised space mission, becoming the first Arab Muslim to journey into space.
Saudi Arabia established a space project in 2018 and began another last year to send people into space, all as part of Prince Salman’s Vision 2030 program for economic diversification.
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