On October 7, 2026, at 12:25 PM, South Korea's Nuri rocket successfully completed its fifth flight. The weather was favorable, and preparations were flawless. Although this marked the fourth consecutive successful launch, it was the first time the rocket launched exactly on schedule without any delays.
Oh Tae-seok, head of the Korea Aerospace Research Institute, held a briefing at the Naro Space Center in Goheung, Jeollanam-do, stating, "The fifth launch of the Nuri rocket was successful," and added, "The primary payload, Small Cluster Satellite 6, successfully established its first communication with the Antarctic Sejong Station at 1:08 PM."
Oh praised the launch for not being delayed even by a minute, noting that this reflects an advancement in launch operation capabilities.
The Nuri rocket lifted off from the second launch pad at the Naro Space Center at 12:25 PM. It successfully executed all flight procedures, including stage separations and ignition of the third stage. The automatic flight sequence lasted 22 minutes and 17 seconds.
The rocket reached a sun-synchronous orbit at an altitude of 575.4 kilometers. Park Jong-chan, head of the Korean Launch Vehicle Advancement Project at the Korea Aerospace Research Institute, explained that the rocket met the target altitude of 570 kilometers within an allowable range of ±15 kilometers.
However, one of the ten Cube Satellites did not deploy, leaving some disappointment. Park noted, "The non-deployed satellite was developed by Quaternion. The Nuri rocket sent the separation command normally, but we did not receive the final separation signal from the Cube Satellite."
The Cube Satellites are housed in a deployment tube, and when the separation command is issued, the cover of the tube opens, allowing the satellite to be pushed out. Park indicated that the cover did not open this time, and video from the payload confirmed that the satellite did not deploy. Oh added that further analysis is needed to determine the exact cause of the failure.
* This article has been translated by AI.
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