South Korea fails to put satellite into orbit’  
  





South Korea failed to put its scientific satellite into orbit after launching its first rocket into space on Tuesday, officials said. The Korea Space Launch Vehicle-1 (KSLV-1) blasted off from the Naro Space Center at 5 p.m., with the first and second stage rockets separating as planned, the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology and the Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI) said.

"All aspects of the launch were normal, but the satellite exceeded its planned orbit and reached an altitude of 360km," said Education and Science Minister Ahn Byong-man, according to Yonhap News. The satellite should have separated at around 302km.

Yonhap reported that experts are currently trying to determine the cause of the excessively high altitude reached by the scientific satellite.

KARI engineers, meanwhile, said that they are trying to track the whereabouts of the satellite and declined to say if contact can be made.

They said that despite the satellite failing to reach proper orbit, the KSLV-1 launch should be seen as a "half success" since the rocket functioned without a glitch.

The launch came after Seoul postponed the date seven times since 2005 due to diplomatic and technical issues and complications in the construction of launch facilities. The latest delay occurred Wednesday, when mission controllers halted the countdown with less than eight minutes remaining before blastoff.

South Korea spent 502.5 billion won (US$402.4 million) on the 140-ton KSLV-1, which stands 33m tall and has a diameter of 2.9m. Its main first stage liquid-fuel rocket, made in Russia, can generate 170t of thrust, with the second stage rocket, made domestically, able to generate 8t of thrust and designed to place a satellite into orbit.

Experts at KARI said that with the rocket reaching the Earth's orbit, South Korea has become the 10th country in the world to send a locally developed scientific satellite into orbit from its own soil.

Engineers said that while the first stage of the KSLV-1 was made in Russia, South Korea has gained valuable know-how that can enable it to make a powerful indigenous rocket able to carry a 1.5t payload into space by 2018.




2009.08.25