One more satellite has been lost by North Korea. The secretive country’s most recent effort to launch a surveillance satellite into orbit was unsuccessful due to a rocket stage separation problem. According to the Associated Press, an issue occurred during the third stage of North Korea’s Chollima-1 rocket’s flight on Wednesday, August 23, while carrying its Malligyong-1 satellite.
It would attempt a third time in October
Space.com reported that some Japanese citizens were told to seek shelter during the launch attempt as the North Korean rocket passed over islands close to Okinawa. Just a few days ago, North Korean authorities informed the Japanese Coast Guard that they were preparing a launch for this week.
Nearly two months have passed since North Korea’s first Malligyong-1 satellite was lost into the Yellow Sea as a result of an unidentified launch accident. After reviewing this most recent failure, the nation’s National Aerospace Development Administration said it would attempt a third time in October, adding that the accident’s specific cause is not a major concern in terms of the system’s and cascade engines’ reliability, according to the Associated Press.
According to the South Korean authorities, hacking groups stole many of the technologies utilized by North Korea to create its spy satellite. The need to safeguard sensitive spaceflight technologies from cyberattacks and theft has grown urgent on a global scale; just this month, the National Counterintelligence and Security Center (NCSC) of the United States issued a bulletin warning private space companies of the dangers of cyberattacks and intellectual property theft.
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South Korea, Japan, US to negotiate a trilateral security pact against the North Korea
In a report from NASA Space Flight, the unsuccessful launch coincides with military drills being conducted by the South Korean and American troops to demonstrate their stability and strength in the face of an increasingly hostile North.
President Yoon Suk Yeol of South Korea, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida of Japan, and President Joe Biden OF U.S. this month, also met to negotiate a trilateral security pact meant to fortify alliances against the North Korean government’s stubborn pursuit of intercontinental ballistic missile technology.
In 2016, on the nation’s late leader Kim Jong-Il’s 74th birthday, North Korea successfully launched a satellite into space. Kim Jong-Il was the country’s second supreme leader and governed from 1994 to 2011. On June 30, 2023, the Kwangmyongsong-4 Earth observation satellite began to degrade and fell from orbit.
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