dearMoon project
The dearMoon project is a lunar tourism mission and art project conceived and financed by Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa. It will make use of a SpaceX Starship spacecraft on a private spaceflight flying a single circumlunar trajectory around the Moon. The passengers will be Maezawa and eight other civilians, and there may be one or two crew members. The project was unveiled in September 2018 and was scheduled to launch in 2023. It has since been indefinitely delayed until Starship completes development. The project objective is to have eight passengers travel with Maezawa for free around the Moon on a six-day tour. Maezawa said that they expect the experience of space tourism to inspire the accompanying passengers in the creation of something new. If successful, the art would be exhibited some time after returning to Earth with the goal of promoting peace around the world.
Artistic rendition of the Starship firing its engines during its lunar flyby | |
| Mission type | Crewed lunar flyby |
|---|---|
| Operator | SpaceX |
| Website | dearmoon |
| Mission duration | 6 days (planned) |
| Spacecraft properties | |
| Spacecraft type | Starship |
| Manufacturer | SpaceX |
| Crew | |
| Crew size | 9 |
| Members | Yusaku Maezawa Steve Aoki Choi Seung Hyun Yemi A.D. Rhiannon Adam Tim Dodd Karim Iliya Brendan Hall Dev Joshi |
| Start of mission | |
| Launch date | TBD |
| Rocket | SpaceX Starship |
| Launch site | SpaceX Starbase, Texas |
| End of mission | |
| Landing date | TBD |
| Landing site | SpaceX Starbase, Texas |
dearMoon project insignia | |
Maezawa had previously contracted in 2017 with SpaceX for a lunar flyby in a much smaller Dragon 2 spacecraft launched by a Falcon Heavy launch vehicle, which would have carried only two passengers. According to a SpaceX announcement in early 2018, the Falcon Heavy plan was shelved in light of the development of Starship.