A Living History of the Humble Paper Airplane

For centuries, paper airplanes have unlocked the science of flight—now they could inspire drone designs

- By Sarah Wells Jennifer Leman

Shinji Suzuki met Takuo Toda in 1999, atop Mt. Yonami in the southern city of Jinseki-Kogen, Japan. Toda, the chairman of the Japan Origami Airplane Association, was there to launch a large paper plane from a tower he had built on the mountaintop for just that purpose.

Toda persuaded the local city council to build the 85-foot-tall tower-with 360-degree views of Mount Daisen, Mount Dogo, and the Hiba Mountains-as a monument to paper airplane hobbyists. The first floor of the tower includes a showcase of precisely folded paper plane models, while the top floor opens into a veritable launch pad.

When Suzuki first met Toda, he was launching the almost-seven-foot-long paper plane-modeled after the space shuttle Discovery-off that very flight deck. "He told me that he would like to launch this paper plane from the space station," Suzuki, now an emeritus professor in aviation at the University of Tokyo, says. "Everybody laughed at him."

Toda's lofty dream inspired Suzuki to take action, and in 2008, the pair announced a project to launch paper airplanes from the International Space Station (ISS). Critics suggested these planes would burn up on their descent back to Earth, Suzuki says. However, he predicted that with a protective coating and a controlled trajectory, they might actually be able to avoid burning up on reentry into Earth's atmosphere. Another challenge? Figuring out where exactly the planes would land.

While Suzuki plotted