As a precaution, the United States suspended take-offs and landings at airports on the West Coast of the United States for 15 minutes.
FROM OUR CORRESPONDENT
BEIJING – There was also Kim Jong-un
, posted with binoculars to a window of his special field bus, to attend yesterday at the second missile launch North Korean
of 2022. The dictator had not participated in the tests for several months and his presence on the scene, the big smiles, the applause of his hierarchs suggest that the fire test was indeed of a certain importance and the result was exciting (from Kim’s point of view).
The analysts drew another detail from the images: in the command car, in front of Kim, there was also his sister Kim Yo-jong, shoulder to shoulder with two senior officials of the Northern military and industrial branch.
The presence of the lady would mean a further elevation of her position: not only in charge of the image of her older brother, but also involved in military activities which are for Kim the regime’s survival insurance policy. Until now, Kim Yo-jong had always only been glimpsed behind the lines of operations, at a respectful distance from generals and very high dignitaries.
Today the Pyongyang propaganda, spreading the images of the Marshal during the test, claims that the missile was of the hypersonic category and who flew 600 km with greater maneuverability than the two previous attempts, making a wide turn and twists for another 240 km before hitting the target placed 1000 km away.
According to the official evaluation of the South Korean Defense, the bomb flew more than 700 kilometers, at a maximum speed of Mach 10 (which means 10 times the speed of sound) and reached an apogee of 60 kilometers. Seoul says it does not believe the missile was propelled by hypersonic technology, but only ballistics (rise and fall with parabolic trajectory: certainly ballistic were the missiles launched by China weeks ago, which surprised the United States).
Tuesday morning for, the North Korean launch has also worried the Federal Aviation Administration Usa
(which oversees the flights of civilian aircraft): a few minutes after the detection of the bomb on the Sea of Japan, take-offs and landings have been suspended at airports on the west coast of the United States.
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Full operation resumed in less than 15 minutes the FAA said in a statement stressing that its policy will always take precautionary measures.
The North Korea claims to have led three tests with hypersonic missiles: the first in September 2021; the second on January 5, 2022 and the third yesterday.
At the moment, only the United States, Russia and China admit to having launched hypersonic devices, the danger of which is not so much in the speed, but in the fact that r
Compared to ballistic missiles they fly at lower altitudes, are maneuverable and therefore can glide over the target leaving little room for enemy defenses to intercept them.
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January 12, 2022 (change January 12, 2022 | 12:00)
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