Enlarge / The Pukguksong-3 missile rises after being launched from a towed barge off North Korea’s eastern coast. (credit: Rodong Sinmun)
On October 2, the military of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea) test-launched what appears to be a new submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) near the port city of Wosan on the east coast of the Korean Peninsula. The missile flew roughly 280 miles (450km), but it reached an altitude of about 575 miles (910 km)—making this the longest-range solid-fuel missile North Korea has ever tested.
The missile likely would have a range between 1,500 kilometers (930 miles) to over 2,500 kilometers (1,550 miles) under normal launching conditions. Japanese government officials said that they believed the missile landed inside Japan’s exclusive economic zone.
According to North Korea’s Rodong Sinmun (or Labor Newspaper), the missile was the Pukguksong-3 (“Polaris-3”), the third iteration of the DPRK’s sub-launched missile. “The new ballistic missile’s test launch was carried out with a high-angle-launch method,” the paper reported:
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Source: Ars Technica – On eve of nuke talks with US, N. Korea tests new sub-launched missile