Japan completed the first flight test of its RV-X experimental reusable rocket prototype on July 11 at JAXA's Noshiro facility. The 24-foot-tall vehicle, developed jointly by JAXA and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, rose about 33 feet and traveled roughly 50 feet horizontally before landing softly on its concrete pad in a 40-second test. The success marks progress toward a capability only a handful of orbital rockets have demonstrated: vertical launch and landing for reuse.
RV-X serves as a pathfinder for CALLISTO, a three-nation project involving JAXA, France's CNES, and Germany's DLR to build a single-stage reusable rocket. Japan's current flagship H3, introduced in 2023, lacks reusability and lags in cost-effectiveness compared to advanced reusable stages, making RV-X's development critical to JAXA's long-term launch service goals. The next test flight will push the vehicle to 330 feet in altitude while adding a lateral crossover and hover maneuver, following a development path similar to SpaceX's early Starship hopper tests.