It’s out of this world.
Nomination-based advocacy group World Monuments Fund has released its 2025 World Monuments Watch list. This year, the list has gone beyond places on Earth—the moon is featured as a historic site facing the threat of looting and exploitative visitation. The group emphasizes that the world requires a global, collaborative effort to protect lunar heritage.
There has been increased interest in space exploration. Space tourism is gaining momentum, with companies offering expensive packages to private citizens to see the Earth from a different perspective. While it remains inaccessible to the majority of the population, space tourism is happening despite concerns about safety and environmental impact. Moon landings are in the pipeline.
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According to the World Monuments Fund, tourism and visits by private citizens may jeopardize the remnants and commemorative symbols of early moon landings. There are 106 artifacts at the landing site of Apollo 11, Tranquility Base, including Neil Armstrong’s boot print. More than 90 such landing sites have been preserved on the moon for decades, but a surge of human activity can disturb them.
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“Exploitative visitation, souveniring, and looting by future missions and private lunar exploration could eventually compromise this truly unique cultural heritage, removing artifacts and forever erasing iconic prints and tracks from the Moon’s surface,” the World Monuments Watch list warns.
The group suggests an international collaboration, similar to the treaty that exists for Antarctica, to promote peaceful exploration while protecting lunar heritage.
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Earthly Sites
Since 1996, the World Monuments Fund has contributed more than $120 million to preserve and raise awareness about 350 Watch sites. Every two years, it releases a list of at-risk heritage sites nominated by individuals and community-based organizations around the world.
For the 2025 list, the World Monuments Fund received over 215 nominations from 69 countries. The 25 monuments featured this year represent 29 countries and face challenges from climate change, war and conflict, tourism, and natural disasters. The two sites from the U.S. that were nominated are the historic lighthouses of Maine and the Great Trading Path, or Occaneechi Path, in North Carolina.
The lighthouses are battling climate change because the Gulf of Maine is warming at three times the global rate. Rising sea levels and storms have made these 66 historic sentinels vulnerable to damage, and the Watch List highlights the need for mitigation.
Meanwhile, the Great Trading Path is an important cultural site for Indigenous peoples, representing their connection to heritage and identity. These are sacred sites for the Occaneechi communities, but commercial development and lack of recognition are severing their ties to ancestral land. “Building public awareness through advocacy and interpretation—and improving consultation processes between U.S. government agencies and Tribal communities—can help honor and preserve the Path’s cultural significance for posterity,” the Watch list states.
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The Buddhist grottoes of Maijishan and Yungang in China are World Heritage Sites, but they are suffering under the impact of mass tourism. Maijishan’s grottoes attract 13,000 visitors per day who come to admire its 194 caves while walking along the cantilevered walkways. Similarly, Yungang’s sculptures accommodate a large number of visitors each year. The sites pose different challenges, but both need intervention for preservation. “The influx of visitors places immense stress on fragile heritage, with foot traffic, vibrations, and fluctuating humidity accelerating the deterioration of artwork and infrastructure,” the advocacy group warns.
Other sites on the list include the Bhuj Historic Water Systems in India, historic sites in Gaza, Kyiv’s Teacher’s House in Ukraine, the Jewish Heritage of Debdou in Morocco, and Chief Ogiamien’s House in Nigeria, among others.
