section_path: Human presence
section_name: Human presence
paragraph_text: Human presence
  
  In 1959 the first extraterrestrial probes reached the Moon (Luna program), just a year into the space age, after the first ever orbital flight. Since then, humans have sent a range of probes and people to the Moon. The first stay of people on the Moon was conducted in 1969, in a series of crewed exploration missions (the Apollo Program), the last having taken place in 1972.
  
  Uninterrupted presence has been the case through the remains of impactors, landings and lunar orbiters. Some landings and orbiters have maintained a small lunar infrastructure, providing continuous observation and communication at the Moon.
  
  Increasing human activity in cislunar space as well as on the Moon's surface, particularly missions at the far side of the Moon or the lunar north and south polar regions, are in need for a lunar infrastructure. For that purpose, orbiters in orbits around the Moon or the Earth–Moon Lagrange points, have since 2006 been operated. With highly eccentric orbits providing continuous communication, as with the orbit of Queqiao and Queqiao-2 relay satellite or the planned first extraterrestrial space station, the Lunar Gateway.