38 North
Reports originating from South Korean and US sources indicate that at 7:00 AM (local time) on March 22, North Korea failed in an attempt to launch a ballistic missile. These reports stated that “North Korea fired one missile from an area near the Wonsan Air Base this morning but it’s presumed to have failed…” and that the missile “…appears to have exploded within seconds of launch.”[1]
The type of missile was not released, but the Kalma Ballistic Missile Launch Site—adjacent to the Kalma International Airport (formerly known as the “Wonsan Airbase”)—is where North Korea conducted multiple tests of its Musudan (Hwasong-10/KN-07) intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) in 2016. The reporting on this failed test was slower to come out and more ambiguous than normal, with no additional information provided subsequently.
No commercial satellite imagery of the area is available from the day of the attempted test, but an image from March 28 shows evidence of a massive 110-meters-in-diameter irregular circular explosion scar on the secondary runway leading to the Kalma Ballistic Missile Launch Site. While we cannot be certain, it is highly probable that this explosion scar represents the announced missile launch failure, as it did not appear in imagery from March 19…
