{"id":56564,"date":"2026-07-11T02:58:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-11T02:58:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/56564\/"},"modified":"2026-07-11T02:58:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-11T02:58:08","slug":"japans-experimental-reusable-rocket-safely-returns-in-first-test-flight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/56564\/","title":{"rendered":"Japan’s experimental reusable rocket safely returns in first test flight"},"content":{"rendered":"

TOKYO \u2014 Japan’s experimental reusable rocket took off and safely landed in a first test flight Saturday as the country seeks to achieve the technology key to cut launch costs and compete in the global space market dominated by SpaceX<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The RV-X rocket lifted off, hovered and moved horizontally before landing during its less than one-minute flight at the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency\u2019s Noshiro Testing Center in northeastern Japan, which was livestreamed by the NVS, a group of space fans.<\/p>\n

JAXA is expected to explain the results in an online briefing later Saturday.<\/p>\n

Japan seeks to catch up with the technology Elon Musk\u2019s SpaceX has been using for several years to cut launch costs of delivering payloads into space.<\/p>\n

Saturday’s flight is a step forward for Japan in achieving the technology needed to develop a lower cost successor to the country’s current mainstay, single-use H3 series<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The flight comes one day after state media in China<\/a> reported the country achieved its first successful recovery of the first stage of a rocket after a liftoff.<\/p>\n

Japan’s H3 rocket is designed to be more cost effective than its predecessor H-2A<\/a> series, which had a near-perfect success record, but still needs further cost cuts to compete in the global space market.<\/p>\n

The Japanese government says a stable, commercially competitive transport capability is key to the country’s space program and national security.<\/p>\n

JAXA and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries have been co-developing the RV-X, which is 1.8 meters (5.9 feet) in diameter and 7.3 meters (23.9 feet) long and equipped with engines with enhanced durability and four shock-absorption landing gear.<\/p>\n

JAXA, which is jointly developing reusable rockets with France and Germany, plans to send the RV-X rocket to a higher altitude of about 100 meters (218 feet) in future test flights.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TOKYO \u2014 Japan’s experimental reusable rocket took off and safely landed in a first test flight Saturday as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":56565,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[8256,8,1878,1124,37194,458],"class_list":["post-56564","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-japan","tag-akita-prefecture","tag-japan","tag-jaxa","tag-science","tag-science-space-akita-prefecture","tag-space"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56564"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56564\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}