The six successful Apollo missions to the Moon were the pinnacle of human achievement. Yet no human has set foot on the Moon since 1972 a world that had seemed on the verge of being an interplanetary stepping stone. Why then has mankind, with all its technological superiority, been so stuck for over five decades?
The answer is not easy or consensus. It is the intersection of politics, economics, shifting priorities, and the inescapable problem of putting men on the moon. As Neil Armstrong once famously spoke a great many years ago on the Apollo 11 mission, “That’s one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.” That leap was followed not by strides but became an instant in time.
The financial hurdle of returning to the Moon is huge. The Apollo program cost $25.8 billion then or over $260 billion in today’s dollars, adjusted for inflation. In its peak year, 1965, NASA consumed more than 4% of the federal budget, and most of it was spent on the Apollo program. Today, the NASA budget is under 1% of federal spending, so such costly endeavors as this one are practically impossible to do without international political and public support. Congressional reductions in NASA’s budget during the Vietnam conflict and domestic economic crisis of the 1970s scrapped planned missions Apollo 18 and Apollo 19.
The moon plans today are still subject to the same budgetary constraint. NASA’s newest Artemis mission to take humans back to the Moon has already been delayed and reduced in cost. The Space Launch System rocket that is the centerpiece of Artemis will cost an estimated $2.6 billion to send into space almost double the inflation adjusted cost of a Saturn V rocket that was employed in the Apollo program. Even though NASA optimistically expects mass production to reduce the cost, the price remains astronomical.
Apart from economics, the Moon itself is fraught with risk. Lunar dust is an electrostatically charged, powdery substance that is very trouble-some to machines and to human bodies. Apollo astronauts incurred hay fever like symptoms when subjected to the dust, which has abrasive silicate particles that saw through spacesuits and seals. Scientific research shows that extended exposure can lead to long-term respiratory illnesses, although long-term consequences are uncertain. Its highly cratered surface also makes landing missions difficult and greatly demands enhanced technologies for life protection.
These risks have led space agencies to opt for robot missions instead of crewed exploration. Remote rovers and probes can collect scientific data without risking life, as demonstrated by successful Mars missions and beyond the solar system. The International Space Station (ISS) in 1998 also advanced manned space exploration to low Earth orbit from outer space, where spaceflight missions focusing on the study of microgravity and the physiology of the living organism have been prioritized.
The geopolitical context is also different. The Apollo mission was conceived under the Cold War a time when the United States and the Soviet Union were in a race to gain technological advantage. President John F. Kennedy’s address to Congress in 1961 rendered the Moon landing a national mission, where he said, “No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind.” The Apollo missions were as much for prestige as for science.
The moon race ended with the end of the Cold War. NASA shifted its focus to co-operative ventures such as the ISS and beyond, to Mars. Maybe there is a new space race coming on, though. China is set to take its astronauts to the Moon by 2030, and private entities SpaceX and Blue Origin are making preparations to sell moon flights.
Artemis, the program initiated in 2017, aims for establishing a sustained human presence on the Moon. Apollo had specifically targeted short term residence, while Artemis explores long-duration presence, with mission development in preparation to pave the way for missions to Mars by crewed humans. Artemis’s program Orion spacecraft, featuring solar panels providing power and advanced life-supporting systems compared to Apollo’s command modules, represents technological advancement.
But issues have occurred. The test flight, Artemis I, which was flown without astronauts in 2022, indicated that Orion’s heat shield experienced issues, and subsequent flights would be delayed. Artemis II, a crew mission to circle the Moon, is being pushed back to 2026, and Artemis III, to send astronauts to the Moon, is pushed back to 2027.
The Moon remains an alluring choice for exploration, with keys to planetary history and possible resources in the form of water ice. But return is only obstacles financial, technological, and political. As long as man grapples with them, the vision of lunar exploration stays in his mind, fueled by the same flame that fueled Armstrong’s historic step a half century before. The question now that remains is not whether and when we’ll return to the Moon, but when and on what new frontier we’ll be journeying when we do.
