NHK’s Document 72 Hours to Feature Amakusa Airlines’ “Mizoka” Aircraft

NHK General’s weekly Friday program Document 72 Hours will feature Amakusa Airlines’ “Mizoka” aircraft. The program staff will keep riding the Mizoka, which operates 10 flights a day, and listen to the travel stories of the passengers seated beside them. In spring, the aircraft carries young people leaving Amakusa for university, families flying for hospital visits, encounters between travelers and local residents, and unexpected incidents that bring a sense of suspense. Document 72 Hours is a documentary program that places cameras at a single location, such as a family restaurant, airport, or izakaya, and observes the human stories that unfold there over 72 hours. By listening to people met by chance, the program captures a slice of the present moment. Program information: Document 72 Hours will air on NHK General from 10:00 p.m. on Friday, May 15. A rebroadcast is scheduled for 9:30 a.m. on Saturday, May 23. Further details are available on the program’s official website. Amakusa Airlines, or AMX, is known as “Japan’s smallest airline.” Based at Amakusa Airport in Kumamoto Prefecture, it operates three routes serving Fukuoka, Kumamoto, and Osaka Itami. With only one dolphin-themed ATR42-600 aircraft, nicknamed Mizoka and seating 48 passengers, the airline operates 10 flights a day as an essential means of transport for local residents and a key part of the region’s tourism infrastructure. Amakusa Airlines will also cooperate in advancing two recently selected projects: the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications’ “Hometown Resident Registration System Model Project” and the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism’s “Leading Project Implementation Program for Dual-Region Living.” The Hometown Resident Registration System Model Project aims to create a platform that allows anyone to easily register municipalities they are interested in through an app, receive attractive information from those municipalities, and deepen their ties with local communities through participation activities. In Amakusa City, the project is expected to link with existing initiatives such as reduced transportation costs and nursery-school exchange stays in cooperation with private transport operators. Under Amakusa City’s existing hometown resident registration system, benefits include special Amakusa Airlines fares, generally for residents outside the city, offering about 40% off one-way fares between Fukuoka Airport and Amakusa Airport, and between Kumamoto Airport and Amakusa Airport. The Leading Project Implementation Program for Dual-Region Living supports pioneering initiatives that address medium- to long-term challenges in dual-region living, as Japan faces regional sustainability issues caused by population decline and aging. The program seeks to create and expand flows of people to rural areas and verify the challenges, effects, and impacts of such initiatives. In the Amakusa region of Kumamoto Prefecture, including Kamiamakusa City, Amakusa City, and Reihoku Town, the project is expected to bring together the prefecture, municipalities, local aviation stakeholders, and others to build systems for accepting dual-region residents in island areas, improve transportation and exchange environments, and verify livable models that make use of local resources. In Amakusa City in particular, the city has formulated the Amakusa City Specified Residence Promotion Plan in coordination with Kumamoto Prefecture’s broader regional revitalization infrastructure plan, with the aim of promoting dual-region living and regional revitalization. In the Goshoura district of Amakusa City, participants in an artist-in-residence-style monitoring program themed around art, history, culture, and food, organized in cooperation with universities that have agreements with the city, as well as fossil researchers at the Goshoura Dinosaur Island Museum, will be positioned as dual-region residents and take part in exchange activities. Dual-region living refers to a lifestyle in which a person establishes a living base in a specific area separate from their main place of residence.