More news is trickling out about the recently made public Tongch’ang-dong missile base near Pongdong-ni, North Korea.

Some of the feature upgrades over their older Musudan-ni facility includes a movable launch pad, a 10-story tall tower , a new rocket motor test pad for better reliability testing and more hills for better privacy.

According to AP reports, engine testing occurred several months ago.

According to U.S. government officials, U.S. intelligence has known about this new base for some years.  But, it took a report from Jane’s Defense Weekly to publicly reveal the details of the capabilities of the new base.

The timing is curious as it comes at a time of heightened speculation about the leadership in the DPRK and amid a stall in the six-party nuclear disarmament talks.

In what appears to be a response to the North Korean missile threats, Korea Times reports that advanced Patriot missile defence systems from Germany has been deployed at unidentified locations throughout South Korea.