North Korea test fired a long-range ballistic missile tonight that traveled 3,700 miles before reaching it’s top altitude in space.
The missile came down in the Sea of Japan.
According to Lucas Tomlinson with Fox News, that altitude is 15x higher than the International Space Station:
North Korea’s ICBM just flew over 3,700 miles into space before splashing down in Sea of Japan 70 minutes after launch.
The ICBM traveled nearly 15x higher than the orbit of the International Space Station days after SpaceX returned four astronauts to Earth.
— Lucas Tomlinson (@LucasFoxNews) March 16, 2023
Here’s more via CNN:
North Korea launched a long-range ballistic missile early Thursday, according to officials in Japan and South Korea, the same day leaders from the two US allies are due to meet in Tokyo for the first such summit in 12 years.
At least one unidentified ballistic missile was fired into the waters off the east coast of the Korean Peninsula early Thursday morning local time, according to South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Japan’s Defense Ministry also confirmed a launch, estimating that the missile would fall outside its Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), approximately 550 kilometers (341 miles) east of the Korean Peninsula.
It added that the distance the missile traveled was approximately 1,000 km (621 miles) and likely reached an altitude of over 6,000 km (3,728 miles).
The South Korean military was maintaining a full readiness posture while closely cooperating with the US, the JCS said.
It sounds like North Korea’s long-range ballistic missile program has made leaps and bounds from where it was in past years. Which is pretty dang scary.
But don’t worry, Joe Biden is on the job and he’ll make sure Kim Jong Un has every bit of our taxpayer money that he wants after Un bullies him around a bit.