First Kairos Rocket Explodes Shortly After Launch

A privately developed Japanese rocket called Kairos faced a major setback on March 12 when it exploded just seconds after liftoff. The rocket, built by Space One, went kaboom around five seconds after taking off from Spaceport Kii in southern Honshu. If you watched the launch online, you could see the rocket hadn’t even cleared the nearby hill when it blew up.

Bits and pieces of the rocket fell back to the ground near the launch pad, but luckily, nobody got hurt, and the launch pad itself seemed okay.

As for what caused the explosion, well, that’s still a mystery. Space One mentioned something about the rocket’s flight termination system being triggered, but they didn’t say why.

The launch was actually supposed to happen on March 9, but it got delayed because there was a ship in the way offshore. Talk about bad timing!

Kairos was supposed to be a big deal for the small satellite market, capable of carrying up to 150 kilograms to certain orbits. This launch was carrying a test satellite for Japan’s military.

Space One, the company behind the rocket, was founded in 2018 and has some big names backing it, like Canon Electronics and IHI Aerospace. They’re hoping to crank out Kairos rockets like nobody’s business, with a goal of up to 20 launches a year. But so far, they haven’t said much about who’s lining up to ride their rockets into space.