Japan plans to send its domestically developed H-2A rocket into space on Saturday, the space agency said Thursday, in the country’s first launch since a mission failed in November 2003.
“We have redesigned the rocket and we are confident that this will be successful,” Masato Nakamura, spokesman for the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, told AFP.
The launch was originally scheduled for Thursday but was postponed because of bad weather around the Tanegashima Space Center in southern Kagoshima prefecture.
The H-2A rocket will carry a multi-function satellite that can monitor weather and navigate aircraft.
Japanese weather officials say they urgently need the launch because their Himawari 5 weather satellite is no longer functional and they have been using a US satellite for weather forecasts.
Japan has successfully sent up five H-2A rockets but suffered a setback in November 2003 when it had to destroy a sixth H-2A rocket just 10 minutes after lift-off because one of two rocket boosters failed to separate from the main rocket body.
The failed test was especially embarrassing as it came one month after China became the third country after the United States and the former Soviet Union to launch a successful manned space flight.
The sixth H-2A rocket had been carrying two spy satellites to monitor military moves in North Korea. Japan was shocked after Pyongyang fired a ballistic missile over the country into the Pacific Ocean in August 1998.
In March 2003 Japan sent up its first spy satellites via the fifth H-2A rocket.
