North Korean Missile Spirals out of Control and Explodes: Video
The South Korean Defense Ministry on Friday released military footage that showed a ballistic missile fired by the North spinning wildly before exploding in mid-air, in its latest attempt to debunk its neighbor's claim that it now possesses game-changing weaponry.
The video was captured by front-line units on June 26 when North Korea launched a suspected hypersonic missile at around 5:30 a.m. local time, according to the South's Joint Chiefs of Staff, which said the projectile traveled about 150 miles before blowing up in the two Koreas' eastern seas.
In the declassified images shared with reporters in Seoul, the missile seemed to spiral shortly after liftoff. Footage captured by a thermal imaging camera showed the missile exploding into fragments.
"Abnormal flight patterns were identified from the ascent phase, and it is presumed that this flight instability caused the missile to explode," South Korea's Yonhap news agency quoted the country's military as explaining.
The assessment matched one released by Japan's Defense Ministry, which said the missile splashed down in the Sea of Japan, known in both Koreas as the East Sea.
The U.S. and its two treaty allies in Northeast Asia have shared North Korean missile data with one another in real time since December.
The flight trail of a North Korean missile witnessed on June 26 in Yantai in eastern China’s Shandong province. Pyongyang said it struck three targets with the multi-warhead weapon, but Seoul said the suspected hypersonic ballistic missile blew up in mid-air. FeatureChina via AP
Seoul said early on Wednesday that the North Korean launch had been a failure, but the additional disclosure sought to dismiss Pyongyang's claim the following day that its top missile scientists have successfully developed a multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle, or MIRV.
MIRV missiles carry multiple nuclear-armed warheads that can be released at different stages in its ballistic trajectory, significantly complicating enemy air defenses by striking separate targets.
The capability, first developed by the United States, is on Kim Jong Un's wish list of sophisticated weaponry, alongside spy satellites and submarine-launched nuclear missiles.
North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency said the MIRV warheads separated from the ballistic missile and struck three ground targets, but its report carried no photographs of the latter claim.
Acquiring MIRV capability is "a top priority" for the country, KCNA said.
South Korea, which said the weapon appeared to be a Hwasong-17 intercontinental ballistic missile last seen one year ago, accused the North of "deception and exaggeration."
North Korea's embassy in Beijing did not respond to multiple requests seeking comment.
Separately this week, Pyongyang expressed anger at the U.S. aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt's deployment to South Korea's Busan port ahead of trilateral naval maneuvers with Seoul and Tokyo.
The Roosevelt departed for drills in the East China Sea as part of the multi-domain exercise called Freedom Edge from June 27-29.
North Korea has described similar moves as rehearsals for an invasion and has used them to justify its repeated missile tests in potentially dangerous tit-for-tat measures on the Korean Peninsula.
Start your unlimited Newsweek trial