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By James Regan

WOOMERA, Australia, July 12 (Reuters) - If all goes to plan, Kimio Sakato will soon paint a second eye on his Buddhist monk figurine under an outback sky in celebration of faster jet service some day between Tokyo and Los Angeles.

Since January Sakato has led a team of Japanese scientists camped in a remote and parched patch of Australia, attempting to prove that a faster and bigger generation of supersonic jets is only a decade away.

The scientists, sponsored by Japan's government-funded National Aerospace Laboratory, have spent the last six months preparing to launch a model of a jet that could one day carry three times as many people as the Anglo-French Concorde and travel twice as fast, with half the noise to boot.

A successful experiment, Sakato told Reuters from a long-abandonded British testing range 300 km (180 miles) inland from the Great Australian Bight, could lead to four-hour flights between Japan and the U.S. West Coast for the price of an international business class ticket.

It will also open the way for supersonic transport (SST) in many new places," he said.

"The Concorde is noisy and dirty," Sakato said. "We would like to have a cleaner and quieter type SST, with twice the range of 10,000 kilometres (6,000 miles)."

LUCKY CHARM

Sakato has vowed to paint the second eye on his monk, known as a Daruma -- a traditional good luck charm exploited by Japanese politicians at election time -- only when the launch of a 15-minute flight is successful.

The prototype is a 1:10 scale version of the X1, which looks like a sleeker, sharper version of Concorde.

"Only when the launch is a success will the Daruma receive a second eye," Sakato said.

The name X1 pays tribute to the jet flown by American pilot Chuck Yeager, who first broke the sound barrier in 1947.

"I think Chuck Yeager would be pleased with what we have done," Sakato said.

A launch of the prototype was aborted on Thursday due to high winds crossing the dusty outback.

Sakato said he and his crew were disappointed by the delay but were hopeful of a launch early on Sunday.

He insists Woomera is an ideal location for testing, but admits he long ago tired of the local food, which includes a "feral platter" of kangaroo, emu and camel meat, served at the township's Eldo Hotel.

"New arrivals bring food from home and I also cook," Sakato said.

PIGGY-BACK RIDER

The model Sakato hopes to launch will piggy-back on a 10-metre (nearly 33 feet) rocket, detaching from the booster 18 km (11 miles) above the earth, and returning at over twice the speed of sound.

Designers see the super jets travelling 10,200 km (6,340 miles) and carrying 300 passengers, but they do not expect the aircraft to be flying commercially until 2012 at the earliest.

The test can only go ahead in wind speeds of under 10 knots for safety reasons.

It is taking place at a testing range built at Woomera in 1947 and run as a NASA tracking station until 1972.

If successful, the test will be repeated in six to eight weeks time with two further trials conducted early in 2003.

The next stage would be to test the NEXST (National Experimental Supersonic Transport) prototype with engines but this would not happen for about two years.

The developers of the aircraft, a project involving Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and Nissan Motor Corp, hope to cut the noise of supersonic flights to the rumble of a Boeing 747 so the superjet can fly anywhere.

Concorde, with its supersonic boom, is only allowed to land in London, New York and Paris.


 
07/11/02 10:31 ET
   
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Japan Hopes to Double Concorde's Speed