The intermediate-range missile was launched from Pyongyang and flew over Japan just after 8am AEST.

The missile is believed to have taken a similar trajectory to a weapon fired over Japan last month, and flew about 3700km.

South Korea’s military reported the weapon reached an altitude of about 770km and was in the air about 19 minutes, making its path both higher and further than the previous device launched.

The distance is far enough to reach the US Pacific territory of Guam, which North Korean leader Kim Jong-un only last month threatened to fire missiles at.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull condemned the attack and emphasised Australia’s alliance with the US and how both nations would come to the other’s aid in terms of the attack, but refused to speculate about any “scenarios”.

His deputy leader, however, was happy to speculate.

Addressing reporters, Mr Joyce suggested the range of missiles being tested could reach South Australia, AAP reports.

“If you have now set off a hydrogen bomb and you have the capacity to miniaturise is to vaporise and murder millions and millions of people, the world is not going to stand idly by,” he said.

Mr Turnbull condemned North Korea’s latest missile test, saying it was a sign the regime was frustrated by tough new United Nations sanctions.

Mr Turnbull told Sky News on Friday the test was a sign the sanctions were working.

“This is another dangerous, reckless, criminal act by the North Korean regime, threatening the stability of the region and the world,” he said.

“We utterly condemn it ... what we do need to do is maintain the united global pressure on this rogue regime to bring it to its senses.”

Mr Turnbull later told reporters a North Korean attack on the United States, as Kim Jong-un has previously threatened, would be like “signing a suicide note”.

“Nobody wants to see a war on the Korean Peninsula,” he said.

“If Kim Jong-un were to start a war, to attack the United States or one of its allies, he would be signing a suicide note.

“That would be the end for his government and thousands and thousands of people would die.”

The White House confirmed US President Donald Trump had also been briefed on the launch, but was yet to comment.

The Pentagon confirmed the missile fired was an intermediate range ballistic missile (IRBM) and said it did not pose a threat to North America.

US defence secretary Jim Mattis called Friday’s launch a reckless act by the North Koreans.

Japan has previously vowed to shoot down any North Korean missile or rockets threatening to hit its territory, but instead responded to this morning’s launch by warning residents to take cover and stay away from anything that could be debris from the weapon.

Japanese authorities today said the nation protested the latest launch in the strongest terms and would take appropriate and timely action at the United Nations and elsewhere.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said Japan was staying in close contact with the United States and South Korea.

“Japan can never tolerate this repeated provocative action by North Korea,” Mr Suga told reporters in Tokyo.

“We have strongly protested to the North, telling them the strong anger by the Japanese people and condemn with the strongest words possible.”

The August 29 launch was roundly condemned by Japanese Prime Minster Shinzo Abe, Mr Trump and allies.

Today’s test also follows the rogue nation’s largest test of a nuclear weapon on September 3, when North Korea claimed it successfully launched a hydrogen bomb.

Minutes before today’s blast, the top commander of US nuclear forces said he “assumes” the September 3 test was in fact a hydrogen bomb, suggesting a heightened concern that the North had advanced to a new level of nuclear fire power.

Air Force General John E. Hyten, commander of Strategic Command, told reporters that while he was not in a position to confirm it, he assumed from the size of the underground explosion and other factors that it was a hydrogen bomb — which is a leap beyond the fission, or atomic, bombs North Korea has previously tested.

Moments after he made the remarks from the US, reports of today’s launch emerged. Hyten made no mention of the launch.

The blast is believed to be in retaliation of sanctions against the rogue nation announced this week in response to its sixth nuclear test.

It comes just a day after North Korea threatened to sink Japan and reduce the United States to “ashes and darkness” for supporting a UN Security Council resolution imposing the new sanctions.

Pyongyang’s Korea Asia-Pacific Peace Committee, which handles the North’s external ties and propaganda, also called for the breakup of the Security Council, which it called “a tool of evil” made up of “money-bribed” countries that move at the order of the United States.

“The four islands of the archipelago should be sunken into the sea by the nuclear bomb of Juche. Japan is no longer needed to exist near us,” the committee said in a statement.

The North also targeted the US directly. “Let’s reduce the US mainland into ashes and darkness. Let’s vent our spite with mobilisation of all retaliation means which have been prepared till now,” the statement said.

The threat also followed the release of satellite imagery taken just days after the September 3 nuclear test, showing the secretive state may be preparing for another blast.

Subsidence crater and scars

South Korean and US militaries are analysing details of the launch, and the South’s presidential Blue House has called an urgent National Security meeting following the launch.

Seoul’s military carried out a ballistic missile drill of its own on Friday in the East Sea, Korea’s name for the Sea of Japan, the Yonhap news agency reported.

North Korea has raised tensions in the region with its rapid progress in weapons technology under leader Kim Jong-un, who is closely associated with the program and regularly pictured by state media overseeing launches and visiting facilities.