The North Korean satellite launched into space last week is out of control and most likely dead, astronomers reported Monday. The apparent failure will not cause the spacecraft to fall quickly back to earth but represents a major setback in Pyongyang’s bid to portray the launching as a patriotic and technological success.
“It’s tumbling and we haven’t picked up any transmissions,” said Jonathan McDowell, a Harvard astronomer who tracks global rocket launchings and space activity. “Those two things are most consistent with the satellite being entirely inactive at this point.”
North Korea’s state-run news media said nothing about the satellite’s dysfunction, focusing instead on the somber one-year anniversary of the death of Kim Jong-il, the longtime leader. As part of the coverage, state television broadcast video footage of his daughter-in-law appeared to confirm that a new member of Pyongyang’s notoriously reclusive Kim dynasty is on its way.
The images showed Ri Sol-ju, the wife of the late Mr. Kim’s son and successor Kim Jong-un, dressed in a dark flowing dress and walking slowly beside her husband inside the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun, the Pyongyang mausoleum where Kim Jong-il and his father, Kim Il-sung, lie in state. Although she was wearing a high-waisted, loose-fit traditional "hanbok" dress, and there was no official mention of pregnancy, South Korean media detected what they considered a visibly swollen belly. The South Korean news agency Yonhap quoted a government source as saying that birth was "imminent."
State media has been describing the satellite launching as a triumphal achievement of the young leader, done in the face of worldwide criticism and United Nations sanctions on the North’s ballistic missile program.
The satellite, said to be about the size of a washing machine, reportedly carries an onboard camera to observe the earth. That mission requires the spacecraft’s orbit to be rock-steady.
Dr. McDowell said the tumbling implies that onboard systems meant to control and stabilize the craft had failed.
He added that radio astronomers had picked up no signals from the satellite and that optical astronomers had observed it brightening and dimming as it slowly tumbled end over end.
“It’s clear that the rocket part of this mission worked very well for the North Koreans,” Dr. McDowell said in an interview. “They ended up in the right orbit. But the preponderance of the evidence suggests that the satellite failed either during the ascent or shortly afterwards.”
The possibility that Ms. Ri might be pregnant emerged in August, when South Korean newspapers, which scrutinize every photo of the reclusive Kim family, found out that a small handbag she was carrying was a Christian Dior, a startling display of the luxury enjoyed by the super-elite, even as its people suffer widespread hunger. The papers also noticed what they called a "belly fat" or a "baby bump." When Ms. Ri suddenly dropped from public view in September, it triggered rumors in Seoul that she was expecting. When she re-appeared in late October after a 50-day hiatus, she was wearing a long yellow coat. Her appearance Monday was the first in 40 days.
In keeping with the Kim dynasty’s tradition of reclusiveness, it is not clear how old Kim Jong-un is.
The South Korean spy agency told lawmakers in July that it believed that Mr. Kim was born in 1984 and married Ms. Ri in 2009. The couple already had a child, it said.
Some analysts speculated that Mr. Kim, who studied in Europe as a teenager, was trying to build a new leadership style by showing up with his wife, whose dresses have reportedly begun setting a fashion trend among the young elite women in Pyongyang.
But recent defectors from the North also reported that Mr. Kim has also intensified control on his people as he tried to consolidate his grip on power. In recent months, many military generals have been fired or demoted.
