What Has Become of Megaprojects We Covered in 2024?

Introduction

The only thing that never changes is the inexorable passage of time. It feels like 2024 was just yesterday. You were younger, I was younger, the world was different (well it wasn’t that different), but this channel wasn’t. We were right here, giving you all the best stories about the greatest megaprojects going on at the time. You’re welcome.

But here’s the thing, some of those projects have moved on a little since we last looked at them. We’ve gone from boardroom designs to active testing, concept renders to realised prototypes, and from big problems… to even bigger problems.

So come with us because we’re headed down memory lane today to give you all some updates on just how these various projects are doing now in mid-2026. So how are they doing? Well, let me tell you, you simply won’t be able to believe the progress that some of them have made.

Without further ado, this is where the rubber meets the road. Or should we say, where the hull meets the water?

The Fujian Aircraft Carrier

Back in 2024, we covered the mysteriously named Fujian Type 003, Beijing’s shiniest, newest fleet carrier. It marked a major milestone in Chinese naval history. It’s the most advanced warship that Beijing has ever built. It’s a truly indigenous supercarrier, with electromagnetic catapults instead of the old ski jump design, allowing it to facilitate the operations of heavier aircraft with more fuel and weapons at sea.

The 80,000-tonne-displacement behemoth still isn’t quite the size of the USS Gerald R. Ford, and its systems aren’t as advanced, but it represents a serious jump in quality for China’s navy that makes it a real blue-water threat. Look at China’s two other carriers, the Liaoning and the Shandong, and now look at the Fujian.

Forget whatever Mao was doing in the 60s, that is a great leap forward.

So, how has the Fujian gotten on since then?

Well, it’s officially become China’s third operational carrier that has been continuously put through its paces by the People’s Liberation Army Navy – yes that’s really what China calls its navy – and yes, I have to mention it every time it comes up, that name is dumb and Beijing should change it.

But here’s the thing, building and launching a carrier is the easy part (even Russia could do it once) but building the infrastructure and culture around a carrier strike group takes a little more than just smashing a bottle of champagne on her bow and sending her on her way. You actually have to learn to use the damn thing, and that’s something the Chinese navy has been working on since you last saw the Fujian. It has achieved a few publicly visible milestones now. It’s undertaken repeated sea trials, it’s capable of launching aircraft, and it was officially commissioned in late 2025, but it will still take a while for it to fully mature.

Because now, China has to tackle a bunch of different things. It has to fuse a ship, air wing, escorts, doctrine, and logistics into a usable carrier strike capability that actually works well with the rest of its naval forces and assets. But it’s working it out. As recently as late 2025, Chinese state media footage and outside reporting indicated progress in launching aircraft with its onboard catapult.

Those aircraft include the J-15T, J-35 and KJ-600, which are serious aircraft to come up against in any potential conflict. It showed that China now has a carrier that – should war break out in its backyard – it’ll be able to project its best airframes further. This thing is a lot more than a floating airstrip, it seems like China really does have the intention of using this thing at some stage.

After all, it’s called the Fujian, which just so happens to be the mainland province closest to Taiwan…

If that’s a coincidence, then I’m Dolly Parton.

The political subtext can’t be lost here either, and it’s part of the wider story around this possible war with the United States over Taiwan that everyone fears may be coming at some point, just nobody knows exactly when. With a range of between eight and 10,000 nautical miles, it’s capable of getting into the Western Pacific beyond the first island chain to potentially strike US targets operating in the region. It’s sending the message that – come wartime – the PRC isn’t just going to sit back and wait for the Americans to come with a rifle in hand. No, it plans to take the fight to them, and that will be something that the US will need to plan for.

But analysts are quick to point out that it will take a heck of a lot more than a single advanced Chinese carrier to deter the Americans too much. After all, bringing together the four horsemen of the apocalypse (that’s Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, and General Dynamics for those of you who didn’t know) is what the Department of War does best. China isn’t exactly ready to go toe-to-toe with Uncle Sam and come out on top.

The US Navy is staggeringly large, so big in fact that it’s the second-largest air force in the world by itself. And the Fujian isn’t perfect. For one, there’s only one of it – three if you count Tweedledee and Tweedledumb with the ski jumps back there – and there are 20 active US carriers with more on the way.

China has got some catching up to do in that regard. It’s also worth noting that even with a large range the Fujian won’t be able to project Chinese power as far given that it’s conventionally powered – while US nuclear-powered carriers only have to go back to port for crew rotations and maintenance and thus can sail rings around it all day.

The US also continues to have a huge advantage in carrier experience, maturity, and combat readiness, as well as more military bases and force depth. The Fujian still represents the next step up for the Chinese carrier fleet. It’s a plan for the future and a statement of intent.

More Chinese carriers are on the way, with the development of the mysterious Type 004 still mostly in the shadows for now, and that one is reported to be nuclear-powered. All indicators point to the idea that China isn’t matching the US yet, but the trajectory suggests it could eventually. But these things take time, so the US has a little while to prepare for a possible engagement with Beijing.

Likely next milestones for the Fujian are more routine operations as Chinese carrier doctrine continues to develop. It will continue to integrate with the Chinese fleet, operate alongside escort and replenishment ships, and eventually take part in dual-carrier or carrier strike group drills, military exercises, the works. Now we just have to wait and see what it’s actually like in combat.

Eight out of 10 – Big boat, very big boat. Very big, scary boat.

The Mexico Interoceanic Corridor

Remember when Mexico saw the Panama fucking Canal and said “Pfft, how hard can it be?”

We covered this (frankly insane) project back in 2024 where Mexico was planning to use the Isthmus of Tehuantepec (the skinny bit of Mexico’s tail) as an overland alternative to the Panama Canal, in theory using railways and a land bridge to shift massive amounts of freight from the Atlantic to the Pacific, as well as creating a whole industry zone around it and a passenger rail network alongside it. Like we said, how hard can it be?

The full corridor is now commonly described as a roughly 300-billion-peso project, or about $17 billion, once you include not just the railway, but the ports, roads, industrial parks and wider logistics infrastructure needed to make it more than just a very expensive train between two seas. But in mid-2026, the corridor is probably best described as only partly operational. It’s unfinished without any real set date for when it’s to be completed. You can put the railways in, but if people don’t actually want to use it and the infrastructure around it, then this won’t be a bastion of global trade.

But there’s positive news here as the logistics start to be adopted. In March 2025, public reporting recorded a pilot movement of roughly 900 Hyundai vehicles arriving at Salina Cruz, being sent by rail across the isthmus to Coatzacoalcos, and then reloaded for the US east coast. That’s a proof of concept that works. The benefits for Mexico, should its full potential be realised, are obvious: increased economic prosperity, useful infrastructure, and a greater say in global trade.

Companies might wish to take advantage of the speed with which freight can pass from one ocean to another without having to wait at the bottlenecked Panama Canal. It offers a genuine alternative if some companies are willing to take a risk to give it a go.

It’s even set to have a passenger line. In November of 2025 the first passenger section of the railway Line K opened between Ixtepec and Tonalá, and the stretch further south seems set to be completed sometime this year if all deadlines are met. This will in theory also help to connect everyday Mexicans to what will hopefully be this economic corridor full of business, entrepreneurial spirit, and opportunity that can reach out to the rest of the country.

But it’s not all sunshine, this is Mexico after all. In late December of 2025, one of the trains on the interoceanic corridor suddenly derailed near the city of Oaxaca, killing 14 people and injuring 98 in the process, apparently because it took a corner too fast. We don’t know how much it cost in terms of money, but by the spring of 2026 more than a hundred victims had entered compensation agreements with the operator. The government also stated it would require a public report, a full independent evaluation, and some form of certification from an internationally recognised body before the trains would resume.

Indeed, Mexico’s transport regulator chief Andrés Lajous said there should be “a complete evaluation of the service.” It seems the Mexican government is calling for increased accountability and credibility as a cornerstone of the corridor project, and that makes sense. If you’re trying to push this overground alternative to the Panama Canal as in any way useful and practical to the rest of the world, it helps if you guarantee that the trains carrying their expensive things won’t tip over like a drunk toddler wearing roller skates.

Its next goal is to have a certified restart after the review and get things… back on track. Pun fully intended.

But it’s not quite that simple, because the corridor has a number of challenges ahead. For one – this is Mexico – and that means the cartels are always present whether you want them there or not. Reporting late in 2025 tied the corridor’s economic importance to growing regional attention from both organised crime groups and the government sending federal security deployments.

It goes without saying that such a logistical hub is like gold dust for cartels looking to traffic narcotics. The state then has an obligation to ensure it can keep the corridor safe, reliable, and commercially trusted because if the cartels intercept your Amazon package, you’re definitely never getting it back. It shows how important the corridor might be for Mexico’s security that the operations and control of the corridor is currently undertaken by Mexico’s Secretariat of the Navy.

Another concern is that indigenous and environmental groups have opposed industrial parks and land use around the corridor. After all, some of that land will be ancestral for the indigenous people who live there, whilst environmental groups have decried the pollution that has come with its construction and the destruction of habitats of native species.

In Puente Madera, a federal court reportedly had to suspend construction of one industrial park along the corridor after concerns arose over irregularities in how the land was acquired. Civil society groups have also reported intimidation, aggression and rights violations linked to the project zone. There’s a lot of money to be made in being one of the businesses in on the ground floor here, enough for corruption and cooking the books to become a serious concern when it comes to businesses trying to get an edge.

The cartels are one thing, but Mexico needs to look out for ruthless businessmen willing to do anything to expand their empires too. Overall, the next big step for the interoceanic corridor is more about consolidation than it is about cutting ribbons and ticker tape parades. It’s about businesses continuing to find footing along the corridor, the expansion of the passenger rail sections and foreign companies giving the alternative route a go.

Due to drought, the Panama Canal sometimes has to operate below its intended capacity, and if that trend continues or worsens then Mexico’s corridor will be right there to pick up the slack.

Here’s hoping the sicarios can’t dig their claws in first. Five out of 10 – Can’t be any higher until they sort out the whole derailing thing.

Ireland’s New Children’s Hospital

So, the last we heard, Ireland’s brand-new children’s hospital was set to open in downtown Dublin and usher in a new era of good health for Ireland’s children, right?

Well… no. The whole thing was a total dumpster fire of delays, overinflated budgets, and an exercise in finding out just how expensive a single hospital could possibly get.

Spoiler: it’s expensive. To the tune of well over two and a half BILLION euros. That’s €530 for every Irish person. Bear in mind that the hospital was originally supposed to cost around €650 million, and you’re left thinking how it’s possible for a hospital that has exceeded its budget by almost four times and still isn’t open yet. Well that’s what happens when you spend a staggering 336,000 euros on a single bike shelter. It was supposed to have more than just a hospital on its grounds, including a research lab, family accommodation and even specialist services, but all of these additions are making the project difficult to deliver. In a way it’s like the hospital has become synonymous with Irish political pain.

And yeah, that’s right, the thing isn’t even open. I told you in the intro you’d be amazed at the progress made in some of the projects we covered back in 2024, and for this one that’s true, we’re just amazed by the sheer lack of it more than anything. Another major milestone was missed in late April of 2026 when it was supposed to be pretty much completed, but even that was a delay from a previous deadline, this thing cannot physically do anything on time and under budget. Keep going any longer and we’ll have to label it an honorary Saudi gigaproject.

These delays have been described as “a huge disappointment” and now it’s considered unlikely for the hospital to open in 2026. Any previous optimism around the project has been deflated faster than a hot air balloon in a barbed wire factory, but that might be an insult to the punctuality of barbed-wire producers everywhere. Children’s Health Ireland – the overarching government organisation that would eventually be running the hospital – also stated that they would need at least seven months after the hospital was completed to commission the building, fit out rooms, install equipment, train staff and prepare for the move. Spring 2026 evidence indicated over 12,000 defects that needed to be fixed across the hospital, and that no less than 15 operating theatre floors needed complete replacement. There are major leaks and duct-cleaning problems that you simply cannot have inside your brand-new children’s hospital. Not to mention that ministers are railing against the idea that rooms being offered up were still absolutely nowhere near ready to look after sick kids.

Listen, this is Megaprojects. We can forgive over-promised and under-delivered. We can cope with overbudget and delays.

Either of those two things by itself probably wouldn’t even be all that much of a worthy update. But what is truly astonishing is the level of incompetence on display here. Not just over-promised, under-delivered, delayed, and majorly overbudget – the hospital isn’t even being constructed correctly to fulfil its purpose once completed.

Rooms still need to be fitted out, equipment isn’t installed, staff aren’t hired, there’s no training being run, and the plan to move all the sick kids into the hospital from others doesn’t have a solid deadline anymore. This isn’t a shopping centre where you can bodge some dodgy temporary fixes whilst everything gets sorted out. No, it’s set to be a live, highly complex paediatric hospital.

BAM Ireland – the company that is taking its sweet time to build the hospital – haven’t even been able to name a solid handover date that they expect the hospital to actually be done. Nothing can really move forward until that point.

And it’s not quite that simple either once everything is completed as we’ve mentioned. Yes, there’s the seven months it will need to even make the hospital operational in the first place, but then there’s the issue of actually having to move dozens upon dozens of highly unwell children in so that they can get the healthcare that they deserve. And yet every delay continues to push back the opening and healthcare of those kids even further. We can understand wanting to be safe rather than sorry, but this isn’t that, it’s needless incompetence holding back something for the public good at great public expense.

Moving those kids is no walk in the park either. Roughly 150 of the sickest kids you can think of will need to be safely transported from their current medical facilities to the new hospital (if it ever opens, that is) which comes with other complicating timelines. For example, you can’t move any of the kids in winter, because that could possibly cause serious health concerns which would render the point of the hospital kind of moot.

A staggered or phased opening of the hospital could cause serious harm because it’s hard to operate a hospital while it’s still being built, putting patients at risk. Some critics report that it’s going to have even fewer beds than originally expected, which for the ballooning cost is a major problem.

Ultimately, while the hospital is a complex medical facility, it’s not a groundbreaking project that should warrant such delays and expense. It’s not like the Irish government isn’t trying to figure out just why all of this has happened, there have been multiple investigations into the hospital’s building at every level, and the finger is being pointed in every direction, from the contractors, to the project management teams, to the designers, to the Irish government itself for commissioning the project in the first place. Considering that it was meant to initially open in 2022, a minimum date of 2027 just isn’t good enough given the money spent. The next step for the hospital is clear, just get the damn thing open whatever that means as long as it’s safe to do so, and hopefully Ireland can leave this national infrastructure trauma behind and learn for next time.

Given the budget overreach, I think it’s only fair to give the hospital a standard score of 40 out of 10. Moving on.

The X-59 Quesst

So back in 2024 we were telling you about the rapidly developing project by Lockheed Martin and NASA to fully realise the X-59’s mission. To recreate Concorde? Well, not exactly but it does look very similar doesn’t it.

No, their plan was to create a working overland supersonic plane that didn’t make a sonic boom when it broke the sound barrier, but a softer “thump” instead, aiming to sit at around 75 perceived decibels compared to the over 100 that traditional supersonic craft can produce. It’s a totally bizarre-looking craft as you might remember from that video because the entire thing’s design is specifically built to mitigate shockwaves. Its extremely long nose, skinny wings, and all its other little esoteric flaps and sensors are all there to do one of two things.

Thing one, reduce the sonic boom. Thing two, record data related to thing one.

The concept is pretty simple. If you can create supersonic planes that don’t create too much disruption for the average person on the ground, then all kinds of things can be built on that to make society more efficient. Imagine freight travel being able to be supersonic, or mail, or even passenger travel – it’s the sort of sliding doors moment that could revolutionise the way in which things move, making the world even smaller for the average individual.

Travelling at Mach 1.4 (or around 924 miles per hour) as aircraft inspired by the X-59 may one day allow people to do could cut the flight times of passenger flights by as much as half in the right circumstances. London to New York could be as short as just three and a half hours of travel time, which is basically nothing in comparison to normal continent-spanning travel.

The ultimate aim in the end is for NASA to get regulators to accept this sonic thump as permissible where the previous sonic boom wouldn’t fly. Pun intended again.

Once the data is all collected and people have their responses recorded by NASA, then the regulator will be able to make an informed decision on whether the idea is safe for the American public. And if the powers that be decide that the sonic thump is all good, then we’re off to the races. In a sense then, the X-59 is the thin end of the wedge for rethinking the current ban on overland civil supersonic flight – which is quite ironic given its shape.

So, do we have sonic thumping all over the United States as test flights in 2026 rapidly soar from California to New York in a fraction of the time?

Well not exactly, the progress towards the next steps on this one has been pretty slow. But then again, NASA and Lockheed Martin are trying to bend the laws of physics for our convenience, so I think we can let that one slide. As of mid-2026 there is yet to be the first public test flight.

But don’t despair as it’s surely coming, with the programme in ground testing and pre-first-flight preparation. A lot of the updates that have been coming have been less “flying through the sky and doing a cool flip” and more procedural and administrative. For example, in late 2024, NASA announced that the aircraft had been cleared to fly faster during its eventual testing, which feels like a really minor thing until you realise building up to the right speeds to test the sonic thump is kind of the point.

It will save a little time in terms of iterative jumps during the testing phase down the line. There are tonnes of these little milestones and doing anything possible to reduce the number of them will undoubtedly be helpful eventually, it’s just not overly exciting right now.

Another update came in 2025, when NASA confirmed that the X-59 would officially be starting its taxi tests, so we know, if absolutely nothing else, that the wheels work at least, and that the engine is capable of dragging the plane forwards under its own power as opposed to being stuck in a hangar somewhere as the world’s most expensive doorstop. For you or me the fact that it can literally move might be enough of an excuse to get the damn thing in the air already but NASA and Lockheed Martin have these annoying things like “health and safety regulations” that they have to adhere to with ultimately experimental aircraft. The American FAA has also managed to clear the contested flight path for the X-59 as well in October 2025, so it’s moving closer to the skies all of the time, and not in the Irish hospital way where everything is forever delayed another year. This thing is coming; it’s just a matter of time until we actually see what it can do, we just need everything to line up right in time for test flights to be conducted.

In a way all the hard part is over, we just have to wait and see when the test flight comes and the data starts getting recorded. After that you’re in political territory so lord knows how long that approval process then takes because a whole different group of special interests have to give the all-clear from their end as well. This is where we’re at, the project could live or die by so many things, from the data they get during testing, to engineering problems, to public opinion on the ground, to political pressure, to cost, to shareholder angst.

Here’s hoping it can thread the needle, because one day – prices permitting – we could have international pizza delivery. And we all deserve to live in a world with international pizza delivery.

A large pepperoni with extra cheese out of 10. Probably the one project on this list that will change the average person’s life the most if fully realised.

Project Quarterhorse

It’s more high-speed aircraft for this one. But it’s a different flavour at the ice cream shop of aviation-based Megaprojects. Beyond just merely going supersonic, we’re aiming for hypersonic, baby.

Quarterhorse is the name of Hermeus’ project to reach practical high-Mach speeds with aircraft through what many are calling a “rapid-iteration” route… whatever that means. To Hermeus, that seems to mean progressively riskier demonstrators towards hypersonic aircraft rather than achieving their goal in one giant leap, accepting the costs of consistently building new iterations for the practical knowledge that it provides in the long run. Supersonic speeds are anywhere from Mach 1.2 all the way up to Mach 5 – anything above Mach 5 is hypersonic.

No manned air-breathing plane has ever travelled at hypersonic speeds, the fastest was the SR-71 Blackbird, which could travel at around Mach 3.3 at high altitudes. NASA’s X-43A hit Mach 9.6 but was unmanned, the X-15 from the 60s was manned but it was rocket-powered not air-breathing. Hermeus wants to finally break this barrier in aviation history, but of course it’s not all for the good of mankind.

Hypersonic aircraft development would change the game for whatever military was capable of developing them first. Hypersonic aircraft would render most (if not all) current anti-aircraft systems completely meaningless. It would allow militaries who used them to rapidly deploy and strike highly defended targets, getting out again before you can even say “national security risk.”

Imagine aircraft that could get half way around the world in under an hour to be able to deploy and help allies all over the planet. That’s a serious geopolitical asset that could go as far as to become a minor revolution in military affairs – the phrase for technological advancement significant enough to change the way how we fight wars against one another, a good example would be drones in Ukraine.

So then, how has Hermeus’ plot for world domination gone since we last picked up with them? The update as far as this one goes is beautifully clean and crisp, a Hermeus aircraft has achieved supersonic flight. Not hypersonic, mind you, but it’s a start.

Back in May of 2025, Hermeus conducted flight tests of the aircraft known as Quarterhorse Mark One at Edwards Air Force Base in California. Then the larger Quarterhorse Mark 2.1 – which is roughly the size of an F-16 and is powered by a Pratt & Whitney F100 just like the jet fighter as well – managed to reach Mach 1.21 in May of 2026. Now that is significant because if nothing else it does show a proof of concept and progress.

Its detractors say that if it’s roughly the size of an F-16, uses the same engine as an F-16, and can go supersonic like the F-16 – then it’s hardly all that impressive. An F-16 Fighting Falcon can go Mach 2.2, so what makes the Quarterhorse so special?

Well, the Quarterhorse is not an F-16, it’s a brand-new project which is aiming to achieve different goals, and to develop something that can reach similar achievements to one of the fastest jets ever built could hardly be considered a failure in the grand scheme of things. If they stopped there maybe it would be, but there seems to be no indication that Hermeus wants to rest on its laurels, as it’s already building the Mark 2.2 and the Mark 2.3 is on the way as well.

Hermeus founder and chairman AJ Piplica stated, quote:

“This flight demonstrates a pace of execution that is extremely rare in modern aviation.”

And he’s right. If you’re aiming for hypersonic, getting from concept to supersonic in such a short time is pretty good going. Take note, Irish children’s hospital.

And the US government likes what it sees as well, with the defense establishment clearly interested in the project. In May of 2026, Hermeus announced that their contract with the American Defense Innovation Unit had been modified to increase the contract ceiling to $219 million. The contract’s goal is to demonstrate high-speed payload releases alongside high-Mach flight to the US Air Force and Navy. That means the US defense industry can clearly see where this thing is going and they’re actively trying to speed up its development to get it there even faster.

Hermeus also announced in May that it would be hiring a new CEO, with Piplica the company’s founder becoming its chairman, having raised more than $500 million dollars as a company in total private capital. The money is starting to flow at scale now and if Hermeus’ rapid development is anything to go by, soon the dominoes will continue to fall.

The thing that makes it such a popular investment is that it’s really not all that hard to see Hermeus succeeding. The SR-71 Blackbird was developed during the Cold War, so was the F-16 and the original F100 that powered it. Other similar achievements like we alluded to before have also been reached. There’s no reason to suggest that with a little R&D, money, application, technological advancement, and time that hypersonic manned, air-breathing flight won’t absolutely be possible to achieve.

And that’s probably the moment where you have to pump the brakes and be a little cautious. Because developing new engines that can sustain consistent hypersonic speeds will take time. We’re not right on the precipice of hypersonic military jets, and the architecture it will take to develop something capable of going a mile per second will take time to mature and get more efficient, just as all technology does. The TL;DR here is that we’re seeing major progress that could one day be the hypersonic dream we’re all hoping for, and whilst we’re not in the endgame yet, it might just start to be a speck on the horizon, and that’s truly exciting.

The next step for Hermeus is deceptively simple, but much easier said than done. Go faster.

Nine out of 10. Fantastic job by the speedy boys, please continue to be even speedier.

Space Tourism

Right. Back in 2024 on Megaprojects one of the videos we made was about commercial space tourism. Back then, space tourism was a rich person’s novelty that he might get to experience before he dies if he has enough money to literally burn in the fuel it would take you to get there. Is it still like that?

Yes, obviously it is. Do you see anyone in your tax bracket going to space? I didn’t think so.

But rather than just staying as it was, the space tourism industry is beginning to mature, to the extent that different business models are starting to emerge that are taking distinctly different paths.

The first is the one space experience you’ve all likely heard of – the suborbital flight. You pay an extortionate amount of money – usually in the hundreds of thousands of dollars – to go just above the official boundary of space known as the Kármán line around 100 kilometres up. There you spend a few minutes completely weightless, see the Earth, and then come back down again.

In total the whole thing takes around 10 to 15 minutes. It’s a fun novelty, but that’s all it really is. The other kind of mission is orbital.

You go up, sometimes to the International Space Station and orbit the Earth for a few days before coming back. This makes the quick trip up and down look like peanuts in comparison though as tickets are tens of millions of dollars apiece. Going to space is really expensive, go figure.

This is reserved for the ultra-rich, private astronauts, sponsored missions doing science work, and the real space purists who simply couldn’t have the cheap imitation crab-level experience.

There are a lot of different actors at play here, so how have they come along since 2024?

Well, it really depends on the kind of service you want to offer. The more expensive version of space tourism may actually be the healthier business as of right now. Meanwhile, the cheaper, up-and-down billionaire vomit comet experience, is the one that looks distinctly less certain.

Blue Origin is the company that emphasises this change the most. Once the world’s richest man and owner of a very shiny head, Jeff Bezos’s company announced in early 2026 that the work on their New Shepard project would be paused for at least two years. New Shepard was the up and down arm of the company, but it seems more resources are now being redirected towards lunar human flight work. New Shepard had previously done 38 flights carrying around 98 people, and with more than 200 research payloads.

That’s enough to give a lot of people watching the industry pause for thought. The most visibly repeatable tourism vehicle in the market has essentially stepped away from the market.

Virgin Galactic, meanwhile, is in more of a holding pattern. The company’s 2026 update stated that the first new spaceship had moved into the ground testing phase. Flight tests are expected to be taking place in Q3 of 2026, and if all of that goes well then commercial spaceflights are scheduled for Q4 of 2026. Sales for the seats have even reopened at a whopping $750,000 a pop.

The next generation of Virgin’s ships are set to fly twice a week and last for around 500 missions each. But if Branson becomes the only name in town for those who just want a selfie with the entire planet, then the business will be absolutely fine.

The orbital side is experiencing something of a real boon. Companies like SpaceX and Axiom can now sell genuinely novel private space missions that last days, marketing them to companies, countries, the ultra-wealthy, or really anyone who is willing to pay. Companies like SpaceX – run by one of the world’s richest men, and friendless weirdo Elon Musk – have the infrastructure to be able to launch real and crewed missions rather than brief joyrides.

And let’s be real if you’re a real honest to goodness billionaire and you have the money to spare, you’re not doing the thing Katy Perry did, you want to see the inside of the International Space Station dammit. NASA is working closely with companies like SpaceX and Axiom for missions like Ax-5 that will take place as early as January of 2027.

Other projects, like the dearMoon circumlunar tourist project, were cancelled back in 2024, so there is still an element of risk here for organisations that can’t balance the hype and the cash flow required for such massive logistical operations. Blue Origin’s slight restructuring shows that too. The fight to be the first winner of space Monopoly is firmly on, but it appears to be taking more of a dual-track path to get there.

A slower suborbital consumer experience market, and a much more serious orbital private-astronaut market that looks closer to commercial expeditionary spaceflight than tourism in the traditional sense. Suffice to say that the latter will likely make more money in the short and medium term, whilst the rest of us will need to wait a long time for the more basic experience to become more affordable. As of now, long-distance leisure spaceflight remains mostly brochureware, and the stars remain out of reach for just that little bit longer.

Who wants to go to space anyway? I hear the in-flight meals are terrible.

Seven out of 10 for space tourism. Progress on “Operation Billionaires Have Too Much Money” continues.

Key Takeaways

• China’s Fujian aircraft carrier has become operational, advancing its naval capabilities with electromagnetic catapults and modern aircraft.
• Mexico’s Interoceanic Corridor faces safety and security challenges, with a derailment and cartel threats complicating its progress.
• Ireland’s new children’s hospital is severely delayed and over budget, with significant construction issues and no clear opening date.
• The X-59 Quesst project aims to revolutionize supersonic flight with reduced sonic booms, but test flights are still pending.
• Space tourism is evolving, with orbital missions gaining traction over suborbital flights, and companies like SpaceX leading the way.

Sources

• Original MegaProjects video: What Has Become of Megaprojects We Covered in 2024?
• Hero image source by Spudgun67 / openverse, by-sa.

Related Coverage