South Korea's homegrown Nuri rocket places 14 satellites in orbit on its fifth launch

South Korea's Nuri rocket, developed entirely with domestic technology, placed 14 satellites into orbit on its fifth launch on 7 October, The Korea Times reported. The Korea AeroSpace Administration (KASA) called the mission a success.

Five main satellites and nine CubeSats

The rocket lifted off from the Naro Space Center in Goheung at 12:25 p.m. and reached a target orbit of about 570 kilometres. It released its primary payload, five NEONSAT microsatellites that will form an Earth-observation constellation, followed by nine of the ten small CubeSats it carried.

One CubeSat did not separate because the lid of its deployment canister failed to open, SBS reported. KASA said the main satellites were placed accurately and that the rocket performed flawlessly.

“With the success of the 5th launch, Nuri's cumulative launch success rate has increased from 75% to 80%, further enhancing its reliability.” — Oh Tae-seok, Administrator, Korea AeroSpace Administration, as reported by SBS

Four successes in a row after a first failure

Nuri's first launch, five years ago, failed to reach orbit, but all four launches since have succeeded. This flight carried 15 satellites weighing about 1,071 kilograms, more than the 13 satellites on the fourth launch.

South Korea plans to launch Nuri at least once a year until 2032, move towards commercial launches and eventually send a probe to the Moon. Five more NEONSAT satellites are due to fly on the sixth launch in 2027, completing a constellation of ten. Space programmes worldwide are expanding what we can observe, from Earth orbit to NASA's new Roman telescope coronagraph.