South Korea on Sunday successfully put its sophomore spy satellite into orbit to help it keep an eye on the North.
The SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket bearing the satellite and 10 other spacecraft lifted off from Florida’s Kennedy Space Center at 7:16 a.m. local time. It entered orbit about 45 minutes later and began communicating with a ground station by 10:57 a.m., according to South Korea’s defense ministry.
South Korea sent up its first homemade spy satellite on December 1, less than two weeks after the North successfully launched its own spy satellite in its third attempt.
Chandan Khanna/AFP via Getty Images
Last month, local media cited sources familiar with the matter as saying that the South was already receiving “good” resolution images of Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, including the headquarters of the one-party state’s Workers’ Party of Korea, and the office of Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un.
However, sources said the images still required heavy editing and that higher resolution ones are expected starting this month, with the satellite expected to begin its full reconnaissance mission” this summer.
The satellite sent up Sunday boasts synthetic aperture radar (SAR) sensors that use microwaves to collect data at night and in all weather conditions. The next three surveillance satellites South Korea plans to launch by next year will also be equipped with SAR sensors.
Newsweek reached out to the North Korean embassy in Beijing and the South Korean embassy in Washington, D.C, via written requests for comment.
Pyongyang may also be preparing for its next launch, South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff spokesperson Col. Lee Sung-jun told reported late last month amid signs of new activity at the North’s Sohae Satellite Launching Station.
Last week, North Korean state media said the Kim regime would send “several” more satellites into space by the end of 2024, putting it on track to become a “space power.”
Washington condemned the launch of Pyonyang’s first spy satellite, Malligyong-1, as a breach of the United Nations Security Council resolutions to block dual-use technology that could advance North Korea’s ballistic missile program.
North Korea’s foreign ministry said the satellite program was necessary for national defense and “improving the security environment of the Korean Peninsula.”
South Korea responded by suspending part of a landmark 2018 military agreement with the North and resuming patrols along the demarcation line separating the uneasy neighbors. The North then quit the pact entirely and announced it would deploy its own forces to the area.
Despite the end of open hostilities after an armistice in 1953, the two Koreas never formally ended the Korean War.
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.