Japan successfully launched the new Epsilon missile

On September 14, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) said it successfully launched the new Epsilon missile using solid fuel, carrying a telescope to observe space.

>>>Japan postponed launching Epsilon missiles by 19 seconds before the scheduled time

Japan's first new missile in the last 12 years left the launch pad at Uchinoura Space Center, Kagoshima Prefecture in northern Japan at 14:15, local time.

Epsilon brought along the SPRINT-A space telescope, the first space telescope that could observe distant planets including Venus, Mars and Jupiter from its orbit around the Earth.

Photo: scmp.com

According to JAXA, Epsilon's characteristic is cheap manufacturing costs, only about 20.5 billion yen (US $ 206 million), while the launch cost is 5.3 billion yen (US $ 53 million), half the name. Japan's key H-2A fire.

Low cost makes Japan able to carry out regular launches with Epsilon missiles to bring small satellites into space for research or observation of the Earth.

In addition, the Epsilon missile also has the ability to test automatically, reduce the preparation time from 6 weeks to 1 week and reduce the number of workers performing the launch with the "automatic zoom control" function.

The Epsilon rocket is a 3-story rocket that is 24.4 meters long and weighs 91 tons, its size is only half that of the H-2A rocket. Epsilon is the next generation of M-5 missiles that have been discontinued since 2006 due to the high cost.

The Epsilon missile launch on September 14 was carried out after two delays in August for technical reasons.