Korea delays rocket launch

Journalists gather at the briefing room of the Naro Space Center in Goheung, South Jeolla Province, to watch a television screen reporting the news that Wednesday’s scheduled launch of the Korea Space Launch Vehicle 1 (KSLV-1) has been delayed due to a malfunction of the fire prevention system at its launch pad. / Korea Times

By Kim Tong-hyung
Staff reporter

GOHEUNG, South Jeolla Province ― Korea called off the launch of its space rocket just hours before the scheduled liftoff Wednesday, due to a problem related to the launch pad's fire prevention system.

This represented the latest setback for the Korea Space Launch Vehicle I (KSLV-I), which achieved the desired speed and height in a previous flight in August last year, but failed to deliver its payload satellite into orbit. Korea's "launch window" for the KSLV-I, notified to the International Civil Aviation Organization and the International Maritime Organization, extends until June 19.

Officials from KARI and the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology were unable to comment on the setting of a new launch date.

Korean and Russian engineers at the Naro Space Center here aborted the countdown at around 2 p.m. after the three nozzles of the pad's fire extinguishing system, which deploy chemical retardants to put out fires from fuel and other flammable liquid spills, malfunctioned and started spraying out their contents.

"A group of Korean and Russian engineers is currently discussing the cause of the problem. It won't be possible to launch the Naro I (KSLV-I) today," said Pyun Kyung-bum, a spokesman for the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology, in a briefing at the Naro Space Center (NSC).

Lee Joo-jin, president of the Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI), the country's space agency, said it was unlikely that the exposure to the chemicals damaged the rocket.

The three nozzles are each placed on the outer rim of the pad equidistant from the rocket installed in the middle, and are designed to be activated only in an emergency, obviously not during a normal countdown sequence. The pad has another set of nozzles, located beneath the rocket, which are used to suppress excessive temperature increases during blast-off.

The rocket didn't appear to be hit by much of the mixture of chemicals and water, Lee said, although KARI engineers and their Russian counterparts were inspecting the vehicle and discussing whether it could have had any possible effect.

In the worst-case scenario, engineers may be forced to take the rocket down from the pad and back to its assembly building for repairs, which could make it difficult for the space agency to meet the current launch window.

"The nozzles weren't included in the categories tested during the final dress rehearsal on Tuesday, although we did check them on June. 4," Lee said.

"The three nozzles disperse about 600 tons of water and about 18 cubic meters of chemicals. About 100 tons of the water and 3 cubic meters of the chemicals were vented during the accident, and we still have enough left to conduct a launch."

Of course, it is critical for KARI to pinpoint the cause of the problem quickly and correct it - if these high-tech sprinklers are automatically going off when they shouldn't, there's no telling how they will work if the pad is engulfed in flames.

The KSLV-I, carrying a satellite aimed at observing the atmosphere and ocean, was scheduled to blast off from its pad at the spaceport at 5 p.m.

Now, KARI engineers find themselves stuck in their own, depressing version of the film "Groundhog Day" - the previous KSLV launch was also delayed once after a pressure problem with the rocket engine triggered the automatic abort system just minutes before the initially scheduled liftoff.

There had been questions as recently as early Tuesday on whether the KSLV-I was prepared to fly. An unexpected technical glitch, related to the rocket's connection with the launch support system, delayed the KSLV-I's installation on the launch pad for hours late Monday.

Talking to reporters on Tuesday, Min Kyung-ju, the director of the NSC, downplayed the severity of the problem, which was detected after the rocket was connected to the cable-mast holding the telemetry cables for the vehicle, although he failed to offer a convincing explanation.

The part-Russian, part Korean rocket is a result of a 502.5 billion won ($418 million) investment. Russia's Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center, which is providing the core technologies for the Korean rocket project, designed and developed the KSLV-I first-stage, which holds the rocket engine and liquid-fuel propulsion system.

나로호 발사 연기

몇 시간 전 한국은 수요일 발사 예정이었던 나로호 발사를 발사대의 소방설비 문제로 중단했다.

이는 지난해 8월 예상 속도와 높이로 발사 되었으나 탑재 위성을 궤도에 올리는 것에 실패한 나로호 (KSLV-I)를 상기시켰다. 한국의 나로호 발사를 위한 발사대는 국제민간항공기구와 국제해사기구에 발사 가능 시간대 를 19일로 연장되었음을 알렸다.

한국항공우주연구원과 교육과학기술부는 월요일 오후 새로운 발사 시간을 밝히지 못했다.

오후2시쯤 고흥 나로우주센터의 한국과 러시아측 기술자들은 소방 노즐중 하나가 비정상적으로 소화용액 분출했다는 이유로 카운트다운을 중단하였다.

“한국과 러시아측 기술진은 현재 원인을 파악 중 이며 오늘 나로호를 발사 할 수 없을 것” 이라고 편경범 교육과학기술부 대변인은 밝혔다.