TOKYO, December 18. /TASS/. Japan’s privately owned Space One company had to abort the flight of its Kairos-2 rocket with five satellites minutes after takeoff, Reuters reported citing a statement to journalists.

The flight was terminated "after judging that the achievement of its mission would be difficult," the agency said, citing an email sent approximately ten minutes after takeoff.

Kairos-2 became the first rocket, whose launch was carried out entirely by a private Japanese company. The blastoff took place from the company’s own launch site in the Wakayama prefecture on the Pacific coast of the country’s largest island, Honshu.

The Kairos rocket was 18 meters long and weighed about 23 tons. Space One, which has its headquarters in Tokyo, has been designing it since 2018. The first launch was a failure. On March 13, the rocket experienced an engine malfunction seconds after blastoff, and the rocket exploded. Its fragments fell into the mountains next to the launch site.

The company aims to reach the figure of 30 rocket launches per year in 2030s.