Korea launches landmark rocket

By Caroline Gluck BBC Seoul correspondent

South Korea has successfully launched its first liquid-fuelled rocket.

The rocket flew for nearly four minutes

The Korea Sounding Rocket Three or KSR-111, blasted off from a military base on South Korea's west coast.

The launch of the first three-stage rocket, produced entirely with South Korean technology, is highly symbolic.

It was a crucial test of the technology for scientists with ambitious longer-term plans to develop a satellite launch vehicle.

Aerospace ambitions

The 14-metre liquid-fuelled rocket, weighing six metric tons (6,000 kilogrammes), reached just over 42 kilometres (26 miles) and recorded data on the ozone layer and the earth's magnetic field, before falling into the Yellow Sea.

The project, developed by the Korea Aerospace Research Institute, was started five years ago and has cost around $62m. The eventual goal is to develop a satellite launch vehicle capable of putting a 100kg payload into orbit by 2005 and a lower-orbit commercial satellite by 2010.

The country aims to become one of the world's top 10 aerospace powers by 2015.

South Korea had to develop its own rocket technology as the small group of countries that had already succeeded in launching satellites would not transfer technology.

South Korean scientists estimate that the country will need to launch about 20 satellites over the next two decades to meet the surging need for internet and telecom services.