Oita: Resorts hope ‘aliens’ will launch invasion of tourists

By Takeshi Eguchi / Yomiuri Shimbun Staff Writer

12:52 JST, January 8, 2022

OITA — Japan’s largest hot spring resort prefecture has launched an unusual tourism strategy that promotes visitors from other worlds. The campaign includes PR videos featuring “aliens” and discount services for guests who identify themselves as aliens in some hotels and other accommodations.

The tourism push happens to coincide with a project to use Oita Airport as a base for launching satellites.

Oita Prefecture boasts the largest number of hot springs and the largest volume of hot spring water in the country, but the number of tourists has nose-dived due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Oita felt it was time to employ an “alien strategy.”

The prefectural government has produced seven promotional videos of aliens enjoying hot springs and saunas in the prefecture. On Dec. 16, in a media event using a costumed actor at the Mikuma Hotel in Hita, an “alien” visited the hotel, received a welcome from the proprietress and enjoyed the onsen hot spring and the scenery of the river.

As of Dec. 16, the project had 45 hotels and other lodging facilities in Oita Prefecture as participants.

Until the end of February, some of the facilities will offer alien discounts. If guests declare, “We are aliens” when checking in at a lodging facility, they could receive discounts on accommodation fees and a beverage service.

Due to the pandemic, tourism to Oita Prefecture has plummeted since 2020. The number of tourists to the prefecture dropped between 37% and 70% each month in 2021, compared with 2019, before the outbreak. So the prefectural government turned its attention to the Space Port project to promote its hot spring resorts.

The promotion videos can be seen on the website: https://uchunooita.pref.oita.jp/

In April 2020, the Oita prefectural government signed a partnership deal with Virgin Orbit, a U.S.-based satellite launch company. It is aiming for horizontal launches of rockets instead of vertical launches, in which an aircraft carries a rocket up to a sufficient altitude and detaches the rocket for a horizontal launch.

The U.S. company chose Oita Airport in Kunisaki, Oita Prefecture, as its first spaceport in Asia because of its 3,000-meter runway and a location that allows aircraft to fly over water immediately after takeoff. It is scheduled to begin operations in April.