![India's Chandrayaan-3 lunar spacecraft undergoes accoustic testing.](https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/c3isro-800x531.jpg)
ISRO
As anyone who has been taking note of space exploration knows, the Moon is red-hot. As much as half a dozen missions may launch to the lunar surface in the following six months, heralding a brand new era of Moon exploration.
It has not at all times been so. Following the Space Race within the Sixties and early Nineteen Seventies, NASA and the Soviet Union backed off their Moon exploration programs. NASA sent probes to the far-flung corners of the Solar System, and the US space agency and Russian space program focused their human activities in low-Earth orbit, constructing and inhabiting a series of space stations.
There have been three primary drivers of renewed interest within the Moon. The primary was the invention and confirmation within the Nineteen Nineties and early 2000s that water ice is prone to exist on the lunar poles in permanently shadowed craters. The presence of abundant water, providing oxygen and hydrogen resources, has given space agencies a brand new reason to explore the poles.
A second factor has been the rise of China’s space program, which has sent a series of ambitious robotic missions to the Moon which have each landed on the far side and returned samples from the lunar surface. China has made no secret of its interest in sending astronauts to the Moon, resulting in competing efforts between NASA’s Artemis Program and China’s lunar station goals.
Finally, there was some interest from private firms within the business development of the lunar surface, each to use resources there but additionally for other purposes. This has stimulated investment in private firms to supply transportation to the lunar surface, including ispace, Astrobotic, Intuitive Machines, and Firefly.
The top results of all of that is that we’re about to see a flurry of missions that can try and land on the Moon. In the course of the last decade, dating to China’s Chang’e 3 lander in 2013, there have been six attempts to land on the Moon. Three of those missions have been Chang’e landers, and all were successful. Three other attempts, one backed by Israel, one other by India’s space program, and a 3rd by a non-public Japanese company, ispace, have didn’t softly touch down on the Moon.
Now, in the following six months, as many as six more landing attempts may come. Here’s a rundown of what to anticipate, and when to expect it.
Chandrayaan-3 (July)
First up is the Indian space agency’s Chandrayaan-3 mission to the lunar surface, which is as a result of launch early Friday on a Launch Vehicle Mark-III. The mission consists of a lander and a rover and follows the unsuccessful landing of the Chandrayaan-2 spacecraft in 2019, which crashed into the Moon as a result of a software error.
The lander, named Vikram, can have a fueled mass of nearly 2 metric tons. It can carry a small 26-kg rover to the lunar surface. The goal of the mission is to make scientific observations, studying the chemical and mineral components of the lunar soil.
India has developed the mission on a shoestring budget, about $90 million, but it is crucial for the Indian space agency to exhibit its competence with this second attempt—especially as its neighbor China has flown a series of increasingly complex and successful lunar missions.
Luna 25 (August)
In keeping with Russian sources, the Luna 25 spacecraft has been delivered to its launch site on the Vostochny Cosmodrome. Roscosmos has yet to announce an official date, however the expectation is that the country will goal an August 11 launch on a Soyuz rocket.
It has been a really, very very long time since Russia (or the Soviet Union) has launched a mission to the Moon. The Luna 24 mission, nominally the predecessor to Luna 25, launched in August 1976. It successfully landed on the Moon and returned 170 grams of lunar soil to Earth. This was the ultimate mission of the Soviet Union, and since its dissolution, Russia has not launched a repeat mission.
The first purpose of Luna 25 is to restart a Russian lunar program and exhibit the aptitude to make a soft landing on the Moon. It can carry about 30 kg of scientific payloads to the lunar surface but not include a rover. Luna 25 has been delayed again and again, but its arrival on the launch site suggests it might finally be able to fly.