Naro-1

Naro-1 (

Neither the maiden flight on August 25, 2009, nor the second flight on June 10, 2010, reached orbit. The third flight on January 30, 2013, successfully reached orbit. The launches took place from the Naro Space Center. The official name of the first KSLV rocket, KSLV-I, is Naro, which is the name of the region in which Naro Space Center is located.^[6][7] Since Naro's retirement, the South Korean government has announced the rocket Nuri as its replacement and successor.

History

In 1992,

The total cost of the first three launches was over 500 billion won (US$450 million), raising concerns among the Korean populace about the value of the Naro space program.[13]

Impediments to South Korean rocket development

Republic of Korea efforts to build an indigenous space launch vehicle is hindered due to persistent political pressure of the United States, who had for many decades hindered South Korea's indigenous rocket and missile development programs

Second flight

The launch of the second Naro-1 took place on June 10, 2010 at 08:01 UTC. The launch ended in failure 137 seconds (2 minutes 17 seconds) later, when contact with the rocket was lost.^[3] Ahn Byung-man, Minister of Science and Technology, told reporters that the rocket was believed to have exploded in midair. The launch originally had been scheduled for 9 June 2010,^[30] but was postponed due to a malfunction of a fire protection system.^[31]

Thirteen engineering experts from Republic of Korea and thirteen from Russian Federation formed a Failure Review Board and met in August 2010 to discuss the launch. They were able to officially conclude that the launch had failed. Further investigation was ongoing as to the cause of the failure.^[32] A new independent team consisting of 30 experts was formed in June 2011 for the further investigation^[33] but failed to conclude the cause of the failure, deciding to send four recommendations for the Failure Review Board instead.^[34]

Third flight

Naro-1 became the first

Launch of the third flight was postponed from its original launch date of late October to sometime in mid to late November due to a damaged rubber ring that caused a fuel leak.[35]^[36][37][38] A launch countdown on 29 November was halted 17 minutes prior to launch due to an excessive electric current reading, indicating some type of electrical malfunction. Diagnosing and correcting the problem were reported to require delaying the launch for at least four days.^[39] The Republic of Korea government announced this would be the final flight attempt. Had the mission failed there would not be another attempt and the project would come to an end.^[40]

While the immediate cause of the leak was a damaged rubber seal further investigation into the failure revealed a defective adapter bloc linking the rocket to the port. Korean ministry announced that the new adapters will be brought in from Russia in preparation for the launch. A new preliminary launch date no earlier than November 24, 2012 was also announced.^[41][42]

While no cause for the failure of the second launch has officially been declared, changes to the third launch were to include eliminating the

Shortly after the mishap with the second launch attempt, South Korea had announced the third flight would take place in 2011.^[45] Specific plans were never announced and no launch attempt was made in 2011.

Political impact

The third launch of Naro-1 occurred one month after North Korea's successful December 2012 launch of their Unha-3^[46] rocket developed with North Korean technology.^{[citation needed]} The launch came in the wake of news that North Korea had plans for a third nuclear test.^[47]

Comparable rockets

• Unha
• VLS-1

See also

• Comparison of orbital launchers families
• Comparison of orbital launch systems
• 2010 in spaceflight
• List of launch vehicles
• Timeline of first orbital launches by country
• KSLV-2

References