By Kim Tong-hyung
Staff Reporter
Technical problems have forced a delay in the launch of South Korea's first space vehicle the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology said Thursday. The ministry is expected to announce a new date on Friday.
Russia's Khrunichev State Space Science and Production Center, which is providing the technology for the project, informed Korean authorities that the final testing for the liquid-fueled first stage of the rocket needs to be moved sometime after July 27 due to unresolved technical issues.
The Russians and Korean authorities are currently discussing a new date for the test. The ministry didn't elaborate what the problems were.
A successful launch of the Korea Space Launch Vehicle-1 from the Naro Space Center, the country's brand new spaceport, will allow Korea to become the world's 10th nation to send a domestically-produced spacecraft into orbit from its own territory.
The 33.5-meter, 140-ton KSLV-1 will carry an experimental satellite, a 100-kilogram device named "Science and Technology Satellite No. 2,'' jointly designed by the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology and the Gwangju Institute of Science and Technology.
The Khrunichev Center, which is providing the technology for the Korean space project, developed the 25.8-meter long lower assembly. The Korea Aerospace Research Institute designed the
solid-fuel upper part of the rocket, which will hold the satellite.