In 2025, the return of a person to the moon has been postponed to 2027 due to the transfer of the Artemis III mission. Despite this delay, the space industry has many other exciting developments in store. Over the next few months, a new generation of private space stations will emerge, India will progress towards sending its astronauts into space, China will attempt to achieve another record, and SpaceX will continue testing its Starship ship.
The International Space Station is nearing completion of its work. While the ISS has long represented global cooperation, political tensions on Earth are increasingly influencing the future of space exploration. China, previously excluded from the ISS, has launched its own “Tiangun” space station into orbit. Meanwhile, Russia is preparing to deploy its own orbital base, and the United States has tasked the private sector with developing a fleet of new space stations.
One of these new private space stations, Haven-1 from VAST, is set to be delivered to orbit by the Falcon 9 rocket in August. This station will accommodate four people for a 30-day mission and will serve as a precursor to the larger Haven-2 modular station project.
China continues to make strides in its space program. Following the success of the Chang’e-6 mission, which brought back soil samples from the far side of the moon in 2024, China is now aiming for a new milestone – its first asteroid sampling mission. In May, the Changzhen-3b rocket will launch the Tianwen-2 mission to collect samples from the asteroid Kamoalev, located near Earth. The probe is expected to return the samples to Earth after a two and a half year mission, during which it will also visit the 311p/Panstarrs comet.
The years 2023 and 2024 marked significant progress in lunar exploration, with numerous missions exploring the moon’s surface. India’s Chandrayaan-3 successfully executed a soft landing at the South Pole, making history. The momentum in lunar exploration is expected to continue in the coming years.
Recent launches include the Falcon 9 rocket carrying the Blue Ghost payload from Firefly to the Sea of Crises crater, and the Japanese Hakuto-R Mission 2 mission to the moon. In February, Intuitive Machines will launch its IM-2 landing module, marking the beginning of a new phase in lunar exploration.