South Korea confirmed Saturday that its first military spy satellite reached orbit after being launched from the United States aboard a SpaceX company rocket and established contact with ground control.
The launch of the reconnaissance satellite, carried by a Falcon 9 rocket from tycoon Elon Musk’s SpaceX, intensifies the space race on the Korean peninsula after North Korea launched a spy satellite last week.
South Korea’s defense ministry said Saturday that its satellite reached orbit shortly after the rocket lifted off from the U.S. Vandenberg space base in California at 10H19 (18H19 GMT) Friday.
“The satellite was launched at 03H19 Seoul time and successfully separated from the projectile 11 minutes later, and was placed on its planned orbital trajectory,” the ministry said in a statement.
“We have confirmed its communication with ground control,” it added.
The device thus became South Korea’s first military observation satellite and will be able to monitor North Korean activities, which are presumed to have nuclear weapons.
Seoul plans to launch four additional satellites by the end of 2025 to boost its strategic capabilities.
“Considering their resolution and Earth observation capabilities our satellite technology is among the top five in the world,” said a South Korean Defense Ministry official, quoted by Yonhap news agency.
To monitor Pyongyang’s activities, “until now, South Korea has relied heavily on U.S. reconnaissance satellites,” Choi Gi-il, a professor at Sangji University, stated.
But after North Korea’s successful launch of a spy satellite, “the South Korean government must also prove it can do it.”
Pyongyang threatened Saturday to “destroy” U.S. spy satellites if Washington “tries to violate the legitimate territory” of North Korea, a reference to its satellite program.
Since the launch of the North Korean satellite “Malligyong-1” Pyongyang claims it was able to observe important points in the United States and South Korea. However, no images of the sightings it claims to have been able to make have been made public.