Korea’s 1st commercial space vehicle launch fails

The HANBIT-Nano, Korea’s first commercial space launch vehicle, saw a successful lift-off from its launch site in Brazil on Tuesday (Korean time) but crashed shortly after due to what its operator Innospace called an abnormality. The rocket was launched from the Alcantara Space Center at 10:13 a.m. as scheduled, beginning its vertical ascent after the successful ignition of its 25-ton-thrust hybrid rocket engine in the first stage. After approximately 30 seconds of flight, however, an abnormality was detected in the vehicle, and it crashed into a pre-designated ground safety zone, with no casualties or additional damage reported, the company said. Innospace said in a statement that it is “determining the cause of the mission’s termination” and “the results of its analysis will be shared later.” Though the company did not specify, the livestream of the launch briefly showed the rocket engulfed in flames about one minute after liftoff, with the message, “Passing Max Q.” Max Q stands for maximum dynamic pressure, which refers to a moment when an aerospace vehicle experiences