[jogiba]

North Korea's long-range rocket failed early Friday, U.S. officials said.

The rocket broke up soon after taking off, the officials told NBC News.

"All indications are that it failed," one official said but went on to say that they are still looking into it.

The White House said it would issue a statement, NBC News reported.

The launch, which North Korea's neighbors and the West say is a disguised ballistic missile test, was to take a three-stage rocket over a sea separating the Korean peninsula from China before releasing a weather satellite into orbit when the third stage fires over waters near the Philippines.

World News - NBC: North Korea rocket breaks up after launch

[jolepp]

The rest of the world can have a sigh of relief (for now): North Korea has demonstrated that their ability to build an ICBM is lacking.

[Medium FormatPro]

The rest of the world can have a sigh of relief (for now): North Korea has demonstrated that their ability to build an ICBM is lacking.

They have quite the number of other replacement models ready to go; they can be out to the launchpad within days. Might I also add; North Korea regularly does business with Iran and several other countries. But if one were to do a comparison and contrast between the american space program (nasa and other onnuamed organizations) an the new one starting in North Korea; then the one in N.K. is off to a far better start.

People seem to forget history when looking at organizations such as nasa; and how nasa got it's start; or even what it does today

[jogiba]

They have quite the number of other replacement models ready to go; they can be out to the launchpad within days. Might I also add; North Korea regularly does business with Iran and several other countries. But if one were to do a comparison and contrast between the american space program (nasa and other onnuamed organizations) an the new one starting in North Korea; then the one in N.K. is off to a far better start.

People seem to forget history when looking at organizations such as nasa; and how nasa got it's start; or even what it does today

So I guess N.K. will put a man on the moon in a few years.

[Medium FormatPro]

Not likely for North Korea just yet.

But China will surpass out entire american space program quite soon- feel welcome to google it (even google map it so see exactly how large scale their program is) China will indeed be going to the moon in about the next five year - to Mars with people (not rovers) in not much more than ten years.

nasa over fifty years with only four major accomplishments; the moon, mars rovers, orbiting failure of a satellite, and an orbital camera that only works about half of the time (hubble). It cost america that much money and that much time; and China will surpass it all rather quickly.

...And nasa has what long term plans and what budget to go with it?

The issue is not much more than political smoke and mirrors trying to use the fear factor. It's alright for countries like america to own massive stockpiles of nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons (and even be literally the only country in the world to have ever used an atomic weapon against mostly civilian cities). But when other countries try to advance their programs they must be stopped at any and all costs.

[Parallax]

North Korea has demonstrated that their ability to build an ICBM is lacking.

I don't know. From the reports on it; it seems to have flown far enough to qualify as an ICBM. Inter County Ballistic Missile.

[kswier]

A new space race wold be fun

[jolepp]

I don't know. From the reports on it; it seems to have flown far enough to qualify as an ICBM. Inter County Ballistic Missile.

Indeed. (I suppose the class below that is 'intra county'?)

[Medium FormatPro]

A new space race wold be fun

I agree a new space race would be both fun and interesting.

Yet the united states has no shuttles left - and for very good reason. The so called reusable spacecraft costed more (adjusted rate for inflation and the like) than any other space vehicle in the world. Even the new program being worked on now weill be considerably less expensive.

BTW nasa has been unusually quiet about all of this. All that we have presently is a bunch of low Earth orbit vehicles.

Interestingly enough expect a bunch of news releases from China; their deep space program might very well be ready well ahead of schedule

[Parallax]

Indeed. (I suppose the class below that is 'intra county'?)

Right; intracounty or intercity. Either way.

[Wheatfield]

I agree a new space race would be both fun and interesting.

Yet the united states has no shuttles left - and for very good reason. The so called reusable spacecraft costed more (adjusted rate for inflation and the like) than any other space vehicle in the world. Even the new program being worked on now weill be considerably less expensive.

IIRC, the Space Shuttle program as it ran was not exactly what NASA envisioned. NASA's original concept was for a much smaller and simpler vehicle, but the Pentagon decided that they wanted NASA to have a bigger vehicle that was capable of doing military missions (they wanted larger payloads). If NASA had been allowed to go with their original concept, I suspect the shuttle program would have been less expensive and perhaps there wouldn't have been two crashes (though considering how many launches there were, the Shuttle was actually a relatively safe vehicle. Launching people into orbit isn't the same as driving to the grocery store, no matter how routine NASA made it look).

[Medium FormatPro]

IIRC, the Space Shuttle program as it ran was not exactly what NASA envisioned. NASA's original concept was for a much smaller and simpler vehicle, but the Pentagon decided that they wanted NASA to have a bigger vehicle that was capable of doing military missions (they wanted larger payloads). If NASA had been allowed to go with their original concept, I suspect the shuttle program would have been less expensive and perhaps there wouldn't have been two crashes (though considering how many launches there were, the Shuttle was actually a relatively safe vehicle. Launching people into orbit isn't the same as driving to the grocery store, no matter how routine NASA made it look).

I know a number of people whom worked onthe shuttle from when it was conceived on a roomfull of mainframes.

The single sole issue that caused the losses of life in the shuttle disasters is; because some genius decided to basically mount "rocket platforms" beside each other as opposed to being on top of one another. Cases in point... The "o-ring" incident; would have indeed destroyed most a launch vehicle, but... Ever since well before the Apollo program that nasa has had a vehicle escape platform. This was made to work with a more traditional vertical launch vehicle, but never made to effectively work with the side by side setup.

The same can be said for the foam striking the main shuttle vehicle incident. It simply would not have happened in a traditional vertical setup.

But nasa management also contributed to killing their own astronauts. They ignored key professional perspective about launch conditions on the first shttle disaster, and then for the second one - it would have been discovered in any routine space-walk of less than one hour. The astronauts from the second incident could have been rescued - it was quite preventable on many levels.

Also getting ito space is not all that difficult; it's just the way that america makes it out to be. In the past, and aslo up to present we had the technology to actually make a type of space elevator. Oh well, the Chinese will do a much better job at it than america ever could. Even Branson will end up doing a much better job than nasa - outside of going to the moon just yet.

[Parallax]

They ignored key professional perspective about launch conditions on the first shttle disaster, and then for the second one - it would have been discovered in any routine space-walk of less than one hour.

I suspect arrogance is responsible for more disasters than ignorance is.

[boriscleto]

IIRC, the Space Shuttle program as it ran was not exactly what NASA envisioned. NASA's original concept was for a much smaller and simpler vehicle, but the Pentagon decided that they wanted NASA to have a bigger vehicle that was capable of doing military missions (they wanted larger payloads). If NASA had been allowed to go with their original concept, I suspect the shuttle program would have been less expensive and perhaps there wouldn't have been two crashes (though considering how many launches there were, the Shuttle was actually a relatively safe vehicle. Launching people into orbit isn't the same as driving to the grocery store, no matter how routine NASA made it look).

The military requirement was for launching a new generation of spy satellites into polar orbit. To do so the shuttle would have had to been launched from Vandenberg AFB in California. The Air Force even went so far as to build a shuttle capable launch pad at Vandenberg. Doing this would have meant that the shuttle would be launched over the continental US. The Challenger was the the end of the debate over whether this should be done or not. The Air Force built the Titan 34D & Titan IV instead.

[jolepp]

...
These Unha rockets are not really a strategic threat to the United States or anyone else. At the fastest, it's two to three days to get the thing from the assembly buildings onto the launch pad, fuelled up and get ready to launch.

There's no strategic surprise in launching one of these things so its definitely not a first-strike weapon and quite frankly it's not a second-strike weapon because once any military engagement starts to take place, these facilities are knocked out instantly.
...

Q&A: North Korea's failed rocket launch and what happens next - World - CBC News