Honda pulls off surprise reusable rocket test launch – DW – 06/18/2025
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Honda says growing expectations of a "data system in outer space" are going to increase the demand for rockets to launch satellites. So, the Japanese automaker quietly built one and tested it successfully.

Honda says growing expectations of a “data system in outer space” are going to increase the demand for rockets to launch satellites. So, the Japanese automaker quietly built one and tested it successfully.

Japan’s second-largest carmaker, Honda, has successfully tested an experimental reusable space rocket on the nothern Japanese island of Hokkaido, the company said in a surprise announcement.

“The test was completed successfully, the first time Honda landed a rocket after reaching an altitude of nearly 300 meters (1,000 feet),” the company said in a statement on Tuesday.

The carmaker aims to achieve suborbital space flight in 2029. In 2021, Honda said it was studying space technologies such as reusable rockets but made no announcements prior to Tuesday’s test

      • BarqsHasBite@lemmy.worldEnglish
        22·
        7 hours ago

        Ehh they have an engine market problem. I’ve seen analysis that Honda isn’t a car company, they’re an engine company - cars, generators, lawn mowers, pumps, a whole whack of industrial things. They really need to shift to electric motors but even then it’s not a 1 for 1.