The Saudi Space Agency (SSA; ), previously known as the Saudi Space Commission (SSC), is an independent entity of the

Government of Saudi Arabia The politics of Saudi Arabia takes place in the context of a unitary absolute monarchy, along traditional Islamist lines, where the King is both the head of state and government. Decisions are, to a large extent, made on the basis of consult ...

established by a royal order issued on December 27, 2018, and elevated to agency status on June 14, 2023. Chaired by Abdullah Alswaha, the Minister of Communications and Information Technology, the agency's role is to advance the nation’s space initiatives. On July 17, 2024, the SSA announced a space cooperation agreement with NASA to collaborate on civilian space research and exploration. This partnership represents a major step forward in the country's ambition to create a robust space sector.

Spaceflights

Before the establishment of the Saudi Space Agency, the only Saudi astronaut was Sultan bin Salman Al Saud, who flew aboard in 1985 as a

payload specialist A payload specialist (PS) was an individual selected and trained by commercial or research organizations for flights of a specific payload on a NASA Space Shuttle mission. People assigned as payload specialists included individuals selected by t ...

on mission STS-51-G which delivered Arabsat-1B to orbit. He became the first

Arab Arabs (, , ; , , ) are an ethnic group mainly inhabiting the Arab world in West Asia and North Africa. A significant Arab diaspora is present in various parts of the world. Arabs have been in the Fertile Crescent for thousands of years ...

, the first

Muslim Muslims () are people who adhere to Islam, a Monotheism, monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God ...

, and the first member of a

royal family A royal family is the immediate family of monarchs and sometimes their extended family. The term imperial family appropriately describes the family of an emperor or empress, and the term papal family describes the family of a pope, while th ...

to travel to space. Abdulmohsen Al-Bassam was the designated backup astronaut. In 2022, the SSA purchased two seats on Axiom Mission 2, a

private spaceflight Private spaceflight is any spaceflight development that is not conducted by a government agency, such as NASA or ESA. During the early decades of the Space Age, the government space agencies of the Soviet Union and United States pionee ...

to the

International Space Station The International Space Station (ISS) is a large space station that was Assembly of the International Space Station, assembled and is maintained in low Earth orbit by a collaboration of five space agencies and their contractors: NASA (United ...

operated by the American company

Axiom Space Axiom Space, Inc., also known as Axiom Space, is an American privately funded space infrastructure developer headquartered in Houston, Texas. Founded in 2016 by former CEO Michael T. Suffredini and Kam Ghaffarian, the company first flew a spa ...

. The mission, launched aboard a

SpaceX Crew Dragon Dragon 2 is a class of partially reusable spacecraft developed, manufactured, and operated by the American space company SpaceX for flights to the International Space Station (ISS) and private spaceflight missions. The spacecraft, which cons ...

spacecraft, included two Saudi astronauts, Ali AlQarni and Rayyanah Barnawi, the latter becoming the first Saudi woman in space. Ali AlGhamdi and Mariam Fardous were designated as backup astronauts.

List of SSA astronauts

References

Government of Saudi Arabia Space agencies Government agencies established in 2018 2018 establishments in Saudi Arabia {{SaudiArabia-stub

Spaceflights

List of SSA astronauts

See also

References