For the first time, the Moon has been added to the World Monuments Fund global “watch list” of heritage places in need of protection and preservation.
According to the New York-based, non-for-profit organisation, the coming era of space exploration and tourism puts cultural sites like the Apollo landing sites at risk from damage and looting.
“We have about 100 places on the Moon where different nations have put material,” Alice Gorman, a space archaeologist at Flinders University and one of the researchers who worked on the nomination for the list, said.
“It might be a crash landing. It might be a human landing site, a robotic probe or rover.”
The designation applies not just to those sites, but to the whole Moon, which Dr Gorman said was “really significant”.
“[The nomination] serves a few purposes,” she said.
“It acknowledges the severity of the threat … it raises awareness, and it puts the international space community on notice.”
What is the World Monuments Fund watch list?
First launched in 1996, the World Monuments Fund biennial watch list aims to raise awareness of significant historic sites in need of protection.
The 2025 list highlighted 25 historic places facing major challenges from issues such as climate change, conflict and natural disaster.
Dr Gorman was part of a committee that looked at aerospace heritage for the International Council of Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS), which undertook the nomination.
Unlike the UNESCO World Heritage listings, which need to be undertaken by a country where a site is located, the World Monuments Watch listings are picked from nominations from individuals or community-based groups anywhere in the world.
UNESCO’s World Heritage convention also doesn’t apply to space.
“The World Heritage convention has concepts that are really useful for us, but we can’t actually apply the convention,” Dr Gorman said.
“So, this is a win for ICOMOS in terms of being able to get some good standards and principles in place for space heritage.”
What has been designated?
While the team only nominated Tranquillity Base, the Apollo 11 landing site in 1969, the final listing on the World Monuments Watch was much broader.
“We were very delighted when they extended that initial nomination to include the whole Moon,” Dr Gorman said.
The listing notes there are more than 90 historic sites “that mark humankind’s presence on the Moon’s surface and testify to some of our most extraordinary feats of courage and ingenuity.”
There’s evidence of six other Apollo missions across the Moon’s surface, and many other rovers and landers from nations around the world including the US, China, Russia and India.
A historic site that Dr Gorman said was regularly forgotten was the first human-made object that made contact with another celestial body. A Russian probe called Lunar Two landed on the Moon in 1959, and detonated a ball of sodium gas on impact so it could be seen from Earth.
“The famous astronomer Bernard Lovell observed it from the Jodrell Bank Telescope in Manchester,” she said.
“It was the very first human contact with the Moon.”
What are the threats to the Moon?
According to Dr Gorman, there are a number of ways that further space travel to the Moon could destroy or damage the artefacts already there.
“Increased traffic on the Moon could mean a lot more dust moving around, and all those amazing cultural heritage places being gradually worn away by sharp abrasive lunar dust,” she said.
“You don’t even have to land next to or near one for there to be an impact.”
Objects on the Moon are also at risk of being taken, as there is a large trade in space objects on Earth.
“Somebody would pay a lot of money for a piece of the Apollo 11 landing site,” Dr Gorman said. Who protects Apollo sites when no-one owns the Moon?
Photo shows A boot print in grey dust.
Space law says no-one can lay claim to our biggest natural satellite, but with people heading back in the not-too-distant future, we need to preserve our Moon heritage — and time is running out.
While permanent settlements, tourism and lunar mining could all cause damage to heritage sites, there may be ways to limit their impacts.
Dr Gorman suggested an environmental impact assessment process — similar to ones we have on Earth — could be done in the planning stages of space missions to minimise any disruptions to important heritage areas.
“There have been a number of studies proposing that an environmental impact assessment process is very necessary for space,” she said.
“Commercial operators going to the Moon [need to be held] accountable to the public.”
What future missions are planned?
Earlier this week, two commercial lunar lander missions were launched into space on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
US-based Firefliy’s Blue Ghost Mission One and Japan’s ispace Hakuto-R Mission 2 highlight the surge in companies wanting to explore the Moon’s surface.
Uncrewed lunar missions are also on the cards this year for US companies Intuitive Machines, which was the first company to land a commercial probe on the Moon in 2024, and Astrobiotics, which made a failed attempt last year.
And SpaceX’s rival Blue Origins also has a lunar lander in the works slated for this year.
NASA’s Artemis 3 mission, which will be the first crewed mission to the Moon in more than 50 years, is currently planned to launch in mid-2027.
Before this happens, the ICOMOS aerospace heritage team are hopeful to put criteria and systems in place to safeguard heritage sites.
“All of this buys us time to get in place international regulations about how to protect this heritage,” Dr Gorman said.
“We need a set of robust criteria that will be internationally recognised.”
In the meantime, groups like Dr Gorman’s are working out how to ensure lunar artefacts are protected for future generations.
“Space is owned by everyone. So little nations and smaller communities should have a say in this.
“These are places important for humanity and representing all humanity.”
