Author Topic: North Korean missile crisis of 2013  (Read 18683 times)

Online Galactic Penguin SST

Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #20 on: 04/10/2013 08:44 am »
Somehow I doubt that they are going to launch something into orbit this time - all reports of US intelligence are focusing on shorter range missiles on NK's south-east coast, not the place intended for larger rockets.
Astronomy & spaceflight geek penguin. In a relationship w/ Space Shuttle Discovery. Current Priority: Chasing the Chinese Spaceflight Wonder Egg & A Certain Chinese Mars Rover

Offline Comet

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Posts: 361
  • Liked: 134
  • Likes Given: 21
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #21 on: 04/10/2013 10:39 am »
I find it a little bit strange, that NO satellite pictures were obtained by the world media.

Offline Steven Pietrobon

  • Member
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 39218
  • Adelaide, Australia
    • Steven Pietrobon's Space Archive
  • Liked: 32738
  • Likes Given: 8196
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #22 on: 04/11/2013 07:50 am »
Yes, the commercial spy satellites should have overflown the eastern launch sites by now. I guess we'll have to wait a few more days before we know if this "missile crisis" is real or not.
Akin's Laws of Spacecraft Design #1:  Engineering is done with numbers.  Analysis without numbers is only an opinion.

Offline Prober

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 10348
  • Save the spin....I'm keeping you honest!
  • Nevada
  • Liked: 721
  • Likes Given: 729
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #23 on: 04/12/2013 01:24 am »
Yes, the commercial spy satellites should have overflown the eastern launch sites by now. I guess we'll have to wait a few more days before we know if this "missile crisis" is real or not.

could be oh too real. A US DoD unclassified report got into the news.  The north could have small atomic bombs.
 http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-202_162-57579206/u.s-intel-nkorea-has-nuclear-bomb-small-enough-for-a-missile/
« Last Edit: 04/12/2013 01:27 am by Prober »
2017 - Everything Old is New Again.
"I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant..." --Isoroku Yamamoto

Offline edkyle99

  • Expert
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 15391
    • Space Launch Report
  • Liked: 8566
  • Likes Given: 1356
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #24 on: 04/12/2013 01:50 am »
A US DoD unclassified report got into the news.  The north could have small atomic bombs.
 http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-202_162-57579206/u.s-intel-nkorea-has-nuclear-bomb-small-enough-for-a-missile/
This should not be a surprise.  They've developed missiles.  Clearly they would be working on warheads.  They've been working on all of this stuff for many years now.

Now, can we dispense with the fiction that North Korea could only reach California with a missile?  Why would they bother to develop such a useless weapon?

 - Ed Kyle

Offline strangequark

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1072
  • Co-Founder, Tesseract Space
  • San Francisco, CA
  • Liked: 226
  • Likes Given: 12
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #25 on: 04/12/2013 02:29 am »
This should not be a surprise.  They've developed missiles.  Clearly they would be working on warheads.  They've been working on all of this stuff for many years now.

Now, can we dispense with the fiction that North Korea could only reach California with a missile?  Why would they bother to develop such a useless weapon?

 - Ed Kyle

Because they're developing incrementally? Also, 12% of the population of the US is in California, along with the second largest metropolitan area.

Offline Lar

  • Fan boy at large
  • Global Moderator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 13463
  • Saw Gemini live on TV
  • A large LEGO storage facility ... in Michigan
  • Liked: 11864
  • Likes Given: 11086
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #26 on: 04/12/2013 04:59 am »
This should not be a surprise.  They've developed missiles.  Clearly they would be working on warheads.  They've been working on all of this stuff for many years now.

Now, can we dispense with the fiction that North Korea could only reach California with a missile?  Why would they bother to develop such a useless weapon?

 - Ed Kyle

Because they're developing incrementally? Also, 12% of the population of the US is in California, along with the second largest metropolitan area.

And Vandenburg. And SpaceX (you know we had to work a SpaceX reference in to this thread SOMEHOW)

My read is that there hasn't been the mobilization of conventional forces that you would expect to see if a war was actually in the offing, and even the most insane Dear Boy has to know that if he actually starts a war that's the end of North Korea as we know it.
"I think it would be great to be born on Earth and to die on Mars. Just hopefully not at the point of impact." -Elon Musk
"We're a little bit like the dog who caught the bus" - Musk after CRS-8 S1 successfully landed on ASDS OCISLY

Offline QuantumG

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 9238
  • Australia
  • Liked: 4477
  • Likes Given: 1108
Human spaceflight is basically just LARPing now.

Offline edkyle99

  • Expert
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 15391
    • Space Launch Report
  • Liked: 8566
  • Likes Given: 1356
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #28 on: 04/12/2013 05:15 pm »
Now, can we dispense with the fiction that North Korea could only reach California with a missile?  Why would they bother to develop such a useless weapon?
 - Ed Kyle
Because they're developing incrementally? Also, 12% of the population of the US is in California, along with the second largest metropolitan area.
Los Angeles is 9,580 air-kilometers from Pyongyang.  Chicago is 10,464 km.  But we're led to believe that Chicago is unreachable.  Why? 

Because, I believe, someone, unable to be certain of the actual range, picked 10,000 km as a theoretical range.  And that was based on the now-debunked idea that NK would not have a light warhead.

Unha 3 weighed 91 tonnes at liftoff.

Thor-Able, first flown in 1958, weighed just under 52 tonnes and could boost a 318 kg test reentry vehicle (the RV part of which was so light that it had to carry ballast) to a range of 10,137 km.  It became apparent to some that Thor-Able could be made into an ICBM with even longer range (they even named it "Thoric"), but USAF quashed that idea.

If the U.S. could do that with such a small rocket in 1958, there is no reason North Korea could not do it today with more mass to play with.

 - Ed Kyle
« Last Edit: 04/12/2013 05:19 pm by edkyle99 »

Offline Danderman

  • Extreme Veteran
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 10288
  • Liked: 699
  • Likes Given: 723
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #29 on: 04/12/2013 06:19 pm »
Note that the mid range Mususdan missiles is allegedly based on the R-27 SLBM, which cannot be moved once fueled.

Offline catdlr

  • Member
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 11187
  • Enthusiast since the Redstones
  • Marina del Rey, California, USA
  • Liked: 8822
  • Likes Given: 7826
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #30 on: 04/15/2013 07:22 pm »
How North Korea Tipped Its Hand

By Eli Lake | The Daily Beast

Quote
When North Korean engineers launched a satellite into space on December 12, it seemed like business as usual, with the familiar cycle of condemnations from the west and statements of defiance from the Hermit Kingdom. But that launch also led many U.S. intelligence analysts to assess that Pyongyang possessed the ability to miniaturize the components necessary to yield a nuclear explosion for a crude warhead that would sit atop a ballistic missile.
After the North Korean launch, U.S. Navy ships managed to recover the front section of the rocket used in it, according to three U.S. officials who work closely on North Korean proliferation. That part of the rocket in turn provided useful clues about North Korean warhead design, should the next payload be a warhead rather than a satellite.

http://news.yahoo.com/north-korea-tipped-hand-084500657--politics.html
Tony De La Rosa, ...I'm no Feline Dealer!! I move mountains.  but I'm better known for "I think it's highly sexual." Japanese to English Translation.

Offline edkyle99

  • Expert
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 15391
    • Space Launch Report
  • Liked: 8566
  • Likes Given: 1356
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #31 on: 04/16/2013 01:24 am »
How North Korea Tipped Its Hand

By Eli Lake | The Daily Beast

Quote
When North Korean engineers launched a satellite into space on December 12, it seemed like business as usual, with the familiar cycle of condemnations from the west and statements of defiance from the Hermit Kingdom. But that launch also led many U.S. intelligence analysts to assess that Pyongyang possessed the ability to miniaturize the components necessary to yield a nuclear explosion for a crude warhead that would sit atop a ballistic missile.
After the North Korean launch, U.S. Navy ships managed to recover the front section of the rocket used in it, according to three U.S. officials who work closely on North Korean proliferation. That part of the rocket in turn provided useful clues about North Korean warhead design, should the next payload be a warhead rather than a satellite.

http://news.yahoo.com/north-korea-tipped-hand-084500657--politics.html
Hard to decipher this report.  The "front section" - does that mean the second stage, or the payload fairing?  We already knew that South Korea recovered the first stage.

Or did the Navy really recover wreckage from the failed April launch?  That could have included the upper stage, guidance system, fairing, and so on.

 - Ed Kyle
« Last Edit: 04/16/2013 02:08 am by edkyle99 »

Offline Danderman

  • Extreme Veteran
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 10288
  • Liked: 699
  • Likes Given: 723
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #32 on: 04/16/2013 04:14 pm »
How North Korea Tipped Its Hand

By Eli Lake | The Daily Beast

Quote
When North Korean engineers launched a satellite into space on December 12, it seemed like business as usual, with the familiar cycle of condemnations from the west and statements of defiance from the Hermit Kingdom. But that launch also led many U.S. intelligence analysts to assess that Pyongyang possessed the ability to miniaturize the components necessary to yield a nuclear explosion for a crude warhead that would sit atop a ballistic missile.
After the North Korean launch, U.S. Navy ships managed to recover the front section of the rocket used in it, according to three U.S. officials who work closely on North Korean proliferation. That part of the rocket in turn provided useful clues about North Korean warhead design, should the next payload be a warhead rather than a satellite.


Most of us here know that any part of a satellite launcher/missile that would touch the payload/warhead would enter orbit along with the satellite, and not be accessible to the US Navy.

IF, however, the article is referring to the "top" of the second stage, ie the interface with the third stage, and assuming that this would be the interface with some warhead, well, then that warhead would be attached to a 2 stage missile, which probably cannot launch a warhead more than a few thousand kilometers.


Offline edkyle99

  • Expert
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 15391
    • Space Launch Report
  • Liked: 8566
  • Likes Given: 1356
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #33 on: 04/17/2013 04:04 am »
Most of us here know that any part of a satellite launcher/missile that would touch the payload/warhead would enter orbit along with the satellite, and not be accessible to the US Navy.
Which is why I'm wondering if the recovery really occurred after the failed April 2012 launch.

 - Ed Kyle

Offline Danderman

  • Extreme Veteran
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 10288
  • Liked: 699
  • Likes Given: 723
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #34 on: 04/17/2013 04:24 am »
Most of us here know that any part of a satellite launcher/missile that would touch the payload/warhead would enter orbit along with the satellite, and not be accessible to the US Navy.
Which is why I'm wondering if the recovery really occurred after the failed April 2012 launch.

 - Ed Kyle

The logic behind the news story is that there is an assertion that North Korea has a miniaturized nuclear weapon, based on recovered payload adapter material. Since we know that the 3 stage design features a small 3rd stage, it doesn't require recovery of a payload adapter/interstage to know that the 3rd stage is small.

Offline Steven Pietrobon

  • Member
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 39218
  • Adelaide, Australia
    • Steven Pietrobon's Space Archive
  • Liked: 32738
  • Likes Given: 8196
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #35 on: 04/17/2013 08:12 am »
Well, its April 17 and two days past Kim Il Sung's birthday. Were there any fireworks or is the "missile crisis" over for now?
Akin's Laws of Spacecraft Design #1:  Engineering is done with numbers.  Analysis without numbers is only an opinion.

Offline russianhalo117

  • Global Moderator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 8755
  • Liked: 4673
  • Likes Given: 768
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #36 on: 04/17/2013 05:15 pm »
Well, its April 17 and two days past Kim Il Sung's birthday. Were there any fireworks or is the "missile crisis" over for now?
hard to say since media is still mainly focusing on Boston bombs attack.

Offline Prober

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 10348
  • Save the spin....I'm keeping you honest!
  • Nevada
  • Liked: 721
  • Likes Given: 729
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #37 on: 04/17/2013 10:24 pm »
Well, its April 17 and two days past Kim Il Sung's birthday. Were there any fireworks or is the "missile crisis" over for now?
hard to say since media is still mainly focusing on Boston bombs attack.

far from over, just watched SKorea news....north won't let food trucks in for S.K employees stuck in industrial zone.
2017 - Everything Old is New Again.
"I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant..." --Isoroku Yamamoto

Offline deltaV

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2159
  • Change in velocity
  • Liked: 621
  • Likes Given: 2138
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #38 on: 04/17/2013 11:05 pm »
It looks like South Koreans are allowed to travel from Kaesong back home, but not the other way around: http://www.cnn.com/2013/04/03/world/asia/koreas-tensions/index.html. So North Korea isn't actually threatening to kill them.
« Last Edit: 04/17/2013 11:08 pm by deltaV »

Offline Prober

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 10348
  • Save the spin....I'm keeping you honest!
  • Nevada
  • Liked: 721
  • Likes Given: 729
Re: North Korean missile crisis of 2013
« Reply #39 on: 07/23/2013 12:30 pm »
2017 - Everything Old is New Again.
"I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant..." --Isoroku Yamamoto

Tags:
 

Advertisement NovaTech
Advertisement Northrop Grumman
Advertisement
Advertisement Margaritaville Beach Resort South Padre Island
Advertisement Brady Kenniston
Advertisement NextSpaceflight
Advertisement Nathan Barker Photography
1