A flight from Japan to the US today takes between 9 and 13 hours depending on the destination, even longer if traveling in the opposite direction due to headwinds. Japanese travel company Nippon Travel Agency wants to reduce this time to just one hour. She announced the start of a project that will significantly change the situation in the air transport industry. Together with rocket developer Innovative Space Carrier, they plan to launch a space route from Tokyo to New York, although this won't happen until the 2030s.
The cost of a round-trip flight will be about 100 million yen ($657 thousand, or about 52 million rubles), however, for regular flights, ticket prices may decrease.
Currently, flight costs are quoted as many times higher than the cost of renting a private jet for a long-haul trip. However, the new route attracts with its thrill. Of course, future passengers will have to face overcrowding during takeoff and landing, but at the same time they will also have to experience weightlessness, even if only for a few minutes.
The passenger rockets will be launched from an offshore launch pad. But how the landing will be organized has not yet been revealed. According to the authors of the idea, in the future, thanks to suborbital flights, people will be able to fly to any point on the planet in an hour. The Innovation Carrier Company plans to introduce an official orbital reusable launch vehicle as early as 2028. Taking into account the stated flight time between Tokyo and New York and the distance of almost 11 thousand kilometers, the speed of the ASCA rocket under development will reach Mach 9. This will make the spaceplane one of the fastest vehicles in the world.
Meanwhile, the technology enterprise is building its own spacecraft, and tourism company Nippon Travel Agency has been promoting the project and developing related products. As a result, starting in 2026, potential passengers will be introduced to space food and given excursions to ground-based facilities.
