Real reason why no human has been sent to the moon in the last five decades

Astronauts have not set foot on the moon in five decades, and the reason will shock you.

You might recall that the last NASA mission to the moon which saw people touch down on the giant space rock was in December 1972, during the Apollo 17 mission.

After having made history, you’d think that it would become common place for astronauts to fly out to continue their studies.

However, there’s a very good reason why they’ve never been back.

I mean, NASA landed 12 people on the moon- it’s something that is no small feat.

The Apollo 17 mission in '72 was the last time a NASA astronaut set foot on the moon (HUM Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

When they got there, astronauts would go on to collect specimens like moon rock, took photos of their surroundings, and also planted flags to let everyone know that they had been there.

But they didn’t go the extra mile and attempt to set up a base for large-scale operations, or even plan out regular visits.

But why?

According to Jim Bridenstine, who ran NASA during the Trump administration, said it's not science that has stopped NASA from returning people to the moon- it’s the budget issues and political strain.

Even though the space agency has promised that we’ll see astronauts once again land on the planet by September 2026 at the earliest, in their Artemis mission, Bridenstine said to reporters in 2018 as per Business Insider, it’s all tied to the president.

"If it wasn't for the political risk, we would be on the moon right now," she said. "In fact, we would probably be on Mars."

Also, there’s a lot of risks involved with setting up base on the moon, and if it’s not done right, it could risk the lives of all on the planet.

According to Chris Hadfield, a former astronaut, who told the publication: "A permanent human research station on the moon is the next logical step. It's only three days away. We can afford to get it wrong and not kill everybody.

It's apparently to do with politics and money (HUM Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

"And we have a whole bunch of stuff we have to invent and then test in order to learn before we can go deeper out."

While it would be tricky, there is one major hurdle that NASA would have to jump over, and that’s the massive costs.

As NASA's 2024 budget was $24.9 billion, it just wouldn’t be enough to cover the expenditure.

With US Congress taking its sweet time to pass its 2024 budget, NASA said that this was a very significant reason it had to cut eight per cent of its workforce at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory earlier this year.

"NASA's portion of the federal budget peaked at 4% in 1965," Walter Cunningham, an Apollo 7 astronaut, explained during his congressional testimony in 2015.

Now, NASA's 2024 budget is only around 0.36 per cent of US spending, as per the the Planetary Society.

With an Apollo mission costing $257 billion today, the $24.9 billion yearly budget is nothing in comparison to what they need to make another moon landing possible.

"Manned exploration is the most expensive space venture and, consequently, the most difficult for which to obtain political support," Cunningham said.

He added, as per the publication, Scientific American: "Unless the country, which is Congress here, decided to put more money in it, this is just talk that we're doing here."