In our era of ever-advancing space travel, it’s hard to believe that it has now been 55 years since mankind last set foot on the Moon.

However, our return to the lunar surface – last touched by astronaut Eugene Cernan’s feet in December 1972 – has been hit by delay after delay, leaving many of us wondering how long it will be until we traverse its rocky terrain once again.

After the Apollo 17 astronauts plunged back to Earth, we might have imagined a future in which we’d all be holidaying up there. Especially given the frequency with which astronauts arrived in the spurt of spacewalks between Apollo 11 in 1969 and the moon’s sixth set of visitors in 1972.

But this was not to be the case. Though space agencies from around the world have visited the moon in the half a decade that has stretched between Apollo 17 and now, no moonwalks have taken place, leaving the grand total of people having set foot on the moon at 12.

So why has it been so long?

Largely the issue has been budgetary. It costs an incredible amount of money to send people to the moon, and this has to be a reasonable return on investment. Add to that wars and major political preoccupations back on Earth, and you can start to see why money was diverted from moon missions.

Notably, we have continued to explore space, with unmanned missions and spacecraft regularly venturing out to other parts of our solar system. But the cost and complications of another manned moon mission have not been deemed cost-effective or important enough.

That is, until Artemis.

In November 2022, Artemis I blasted off.

This uncrewed mission was in space for 25 days before splashing down in December 2022. Its purpose? To test NASA’s new moon rocket, with its Orion spacecraft designed to carry astronauts to the moon, and later to Mars.

With Artemis missions II and III in the planning stages, Artemis I was crucial to NASA’s new-found determination to put people on the moon once again.

However, the recovered Orion spacecraft threw all that into question.

As the capsule re-entered our atmosphere, it’s heat shield – fundamental to the safety of any astronauts it might carry – failed, causing it to crack.

The failure of this vital piece of hardware has caused the Artemis II and III missions to be pushed back over and over, with the public left to ponder if and when the selected astronauts will be able to travel.

And the confusion and lack of clarity had not been helped by NASA’s ongoing vagueness about the problem.

In an interview with Ars Technica, Lakiesha Hawkins from NASA’s Moon to Mars program office gave a vague answer to the speculation, confirming that the issue had been identified but leaving the world none-the-wiser as to what it was:

“We have gotten to a root cause. We are having conversations within the agency to make sure that we have a good understanding of not only what’s going on with the heat shield, but also next steps and how that actually applies to the course that we take for Artemis II. And we’ll be in a position to be able to share where we are with that hopefully before the end of the year.”

However, in December 2024, NASA’s conclusive findings were revealed, with a panel of experts explaining the processes that caused the cracking:

“During the period between dips into the atmosphere, heating rates decreased, and thermal energy accumulated inside the heat shield’s Avcoat material. This led to the accumulation of gases that are part of the expected ablation process. Because the Avcoat did not have “permeability,” internal pressure built up, and led to cracking and uneven shedding of the outer layer.”

Comfortingly, the experts added, rigorous tests proved that even if astronauts had been onboard Orion at the moment of atmospheric re-entry, they would have remained entirely unharmed.

With clarity now shed on the Orion issue, the Artemis II and III missions schedule is set – albeit with a little delay.

Artemis II – a lunar flyby rather than a lunar landing – is scheduled to take place over ten days in April 2026, leaving space aficionados with just over a year to wait, if the mission takes place on time.

This flyby will allow NASA to further test the equipment as the Space Lunar System (SLS) rocket and Orion capsule journey around the moon before heading back to Earth once more.

If all goes to plan this time, Artemis II will pave the way for the most exciting of the three missions: Artemis III.

Currently scheduled loosely for mid 2027, the rocket will be crewed by four astronauts, and – should the mission be successful – humans will be on the Moon’s surface once again.

What’s more, Artemis III will deliver the first woman and the first person of color to the moon’s surface, with the crew made up of Commander Reid Wiseman, Pilot Victor Glover and Mission Specialists Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen first journeying to the moon in Artemis II before hopefully taking part in Artemis III too.

All being well, we don’t have too long to wait before we can bear witness to the next in the long-paused series of small steps for mankind.

Be patient, space fans. These astronauts will be treading the lunar surface very soon.

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