Date: 28/10/2023

Forecasting Our Return to the Moon

No one has set foot upon the moon since 1972. On which year will we return?

I will first look at China and the USA in turn. Then I will look at the overall probabilities.

China

Basic Information

The mission is to send two astronauts to the Moon before 2030. This was announced by the CMSA in May 2023. The success of the mission will be dependent on the development of the Long March 10 rocket, a new-generation crew spacecraft, a lander, a rover, and a lunar spacesuit. All of these are new technologies, in various stages of development and pre-development.

Timeline

The wording is almost-always "before 2030", but in at least one case "2029". I think that this is what "before 2030" really means, given how much development and testing is required for the mission - I'll grant that it could happen in 2028, but almost certainly not earlier. The Chinese seem very confident in their ability to land astronauts on the Moon before 2030. My rough estimation of the probabilities by year are as follow:

Reading

• spacenews.com "China sets sights on crewed lunar landing before 2030"
• spacenews.com "China sets out preliminary crewed lunar landing plan"
• A post on X "Two Chinese astronauts will land on the Moon in 2029"

United States of America

Basic Information

The Americans currently plan to return to the surface of the moon with their Artemis III mission, scheduled to take place in December 2025. However, if the required technology is not ready by the time of the mission, Artemis III may become a lunar orbit mission. In this case, Artemis IV, scheduled to take place in September 2028 at the earliest, would become the mission in which the Americans return to the surface of the Moon.

Timeline

The official date for the mission is 2025. But Jim Free said the launch would probably be no earlier than 2026. And later expressed doubt that the mission would be able to achieve a manned lunar landing at all. This would push back the American return to the surface of the Moon to September 2028 at the earliest with their Artemis IV mission. But it seems likely that this date too will be pushed back. Competition from China may cause the Americans to become more serious, so I expect there is a good chance they will finally return to the Moon's surface in late 2028, in 2029, or in 2030. A landing in 2026 seems possible but extremely unlikely. A landing in 2027 seems possible but very unlikely. A landing in 2028 seems to be the earliest realistic date, but by that point will involve an entirely new mission which I suspect will come with further delays, making 2029, 2030, or later the likliest time period for their return to the surface of the Moon.

Reading

• Wikipedia page on Artemis III
• Wikipedia page on Artemis IV
• Archive of channelnewsasia.com "NASA may delay crewed lunar landing beyond Artemis 3 mission"
• arstechnica.com "The oracle who predicted SLS’s launch in 2023 has thoughts about Artemis III"
• space.com "SpaceX Starship problems likely to delay Artemis 3 moon mission to 2026, NASA says"

Overall Probabilities

The probabilities by country:

To find the overall probabilities, we cannot simply add the probabilities for China and the USA, because we need to account for the possibility that when China makes its first landing the USA had made a landing in a previous year, and vice versa.

Calculations

Probability by year that China lands astronauts on the Moon and it is the year of man's return to the Moon (calculated my multiplying the probability that China makes its first crewed landing on the Moon in the given year by the inverse of the probability that the USA has already reached the Moon in a previous year):

Probability by year that the USA lands astronauts on the Moon and it is the year of man's return to the Moon (calculated by mulitplying the probabilty that the USA makes its return in the given year by the inverse of the probability that China has already reached the Moon in a previous year):

Results (Overall Probability)

Probability that the given year is the one in which humans return to the surface of the Moon (calculated by taking the inverse of the probability that neither country succeeds in the given year):