TOKYO — Honda Motor successfully launched and landed a small reusable rocket Tuesday, becoming the first private-sector company in Japan to do so and marking a step toward its goal of a suborbital flight by 2029.
The experimental device lifted off in the evening at the automaker’s research base in Hokkaido, flew to an altitude of 300 meters and successfully landed within 37 centimeters of the target area, the company said, significantly better than the 5-meter goal. Subsidiary Honda R&D conducted the test.
