South Korea conducted a salvage operation on Wednesday to recover an object presumed to be the wreckage of a North Korean military spy satellite that had crashed into the sea due to rocket malfunction.
North Korea launched its military reconnaissance satellite using the newly developed “Chollima-1” rocket at around 6.27 a.m. local time on Wednesday at the North’s Sohae Satellite Launching Ground.
The rocket crashed into the West Sea of Korea shortly after takeoff. The state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported the rocket “lost thrust due to abnormal start of the two-stage engine.”
The North’s National Aerospace Development Administration attributed the failure to “the low reliability and stability of the new-type engine system” and the “unstable specifications of the fuel,” it stated….