Possibly Better Than the American Shuttle, Now Forgotten

The last American space shuttle is about to come back to Earth in glory, ending the storied 30-year program. After landing it will end up in a museum. This is a very different ending from the one experienced by the Soviet answer to the space shuttle. The Buran shuttles are slowly deteriorating, forgotten and abandoned throughout Russia and Kazakhstan.

The space shuttles have it all. They are taken care of by thousands of specialists, and NASA always made sure that their launches are covered by HD television crews. They were the only reusable manned spacecraft. They are famous.

The Soviet shuttles, the result of the forgotten Buran program, met with a totally different fate. They could have been better than the space shuttles, but they were never given the chance to prove themselves. They were prevented from doing so by the collapse of the Soviet Union.

The Buran program was officially launched in 1974, in response to the space shuttle program, launched two years earlier. The aims of both programs were fundamentally identical. Both countries wanted to build reusable vehicles, capable of carrying large crews and cargo into orbit.

The Soviet military was the driving force behind the Buran. The military brass was concerned about the military potential of the space shuttles and wanted a shuttle program that would produce comparable or better vehicles. Though the engineers proposed a smaller, cost effective alternative, the leadership pushed for the large-winged shuttles.

The Herd

Like many other flagship programs in the USSR, Buran was inaugurated in style. The Moscow factory belonging to NPO Molnija, especially constructed for Buran production, started building the first prototypes in the early ’80s.

In 1984, the first test shuttle that was able to fly like a regular airplane was finished, thanks to the installed jet engines. The model (designated OK- GLI) was used to test Buran’s ability to land. Five other test models were built and were used for various experiments. None of these were designated for space flight, and they lacked many of the essential systems required to do so.

The next step was building the actual space-worthy shuttles. Construction started on five, but only one was ever fully built.

The Mighty Energia

Besides the Buran shuttles themselves, the Soviets also worked to develop a rocket that would carry it into space. This new rocket was named Energia, and, in contrast to the American rocket system, it was non-reusable. In terms of size and lifting capability, it matched the American system.

The Soviets completed only one Buran-Energia configuration, but it could carry 100 tons of cargo and weighed 2,400 tons. The Energia was the most powerful rocket built and launched in the USSR. Its force was equivalent to 170 million horsepower.

Other Energia variants were designed to launch vehicles to the moon.

Better than the Americans

It took Soviet engineers four years between the completion of the first test vehicle to achievement of the ultimate goal: space flight. The historic moment took place, and on Nov. 15, 1988, the first Buran shuttle was lifted into space by the Energia from Baikonour.

The Buran was unmanned on that flight. The vehicle carried out the entire mission automatically, unlike the space shuttle, which carried two astronauts for its first flight. The Russians probably did not want to risk disaster, and they programmed their avant-garde creation to perform by itself.

After 206 minutes and two orbits, the Buran reentered the atmosphere and landed in Baikonour. It was the first completely automated flight of a space ship into orbit and back down again. The Americans managed to accomplish a similar feat in 2010, with the flight of the small space plane, the X-37.

Rendezvous with Reality

The next flight, to be carried out by the second Buran, was planned for 1991. The first crewed flight was to take place in 1994, after three more unmanned tests. One of the unmanned test flights would involve the Buran docking with the Mir space station.

The collapse of the USSR put a stop on all of these ambitious plans. The Buran program was dreadfully expensive, and though precise figures were never published, it was thought to be the most expensive program in the Soviet space program. With the fall of the empire in 1991, the flow of money stopped. The program was officially cancelled in 1993. There wasn’t even enough money to properly terminate the program, such as the conservation of the already built shuttles, rockets, and other machinery.

In accordance with treaties signed after the fall of the USSR, most of the abandoned Buran equipment was handed over to Kazakhstan.

The End of Dreams

The one Buran shuttle that was completed and flown in space remained in a service hangar in Baikonour. In 2002, it met a sad end when the roof of the hangar collapsed, killing seven people who were working on its preservation. The Energia rocket and the Buran were totally destroyed. The roof collapsed due to neglect and heavy rainfall.

Also in Baikonour is another Buran, the nearly completed “Ptishka,” which has remained in relatively good condition and is a local tourist attraction. The third Buran was mothballed in the warehouse in the Moscow factory where it was built, slowly deteriorating. Recently, proposals have been put forth to restore and display the spacecraft. The fourth Buran, which only consists of a hollow fuselage, has been slowly rotting away in a parking lot outside of Moscow. The fifth Buran was totally broken up for scrap.

The Buran test shuttles also met a varied fate. One is displayed in Gorky Park in Moscow. Another one, after an odyssey through Bahrain and Australia, is now in the Technikmuseum Speyer in Germany. Two test shuttles remained in Baikonour as test articles, and two more are located in scientific institutes in Moscow. Most of them are in a terrible state of decay after years of funding drought and a lack of conservation.

The Great Waste

If the Buran program was realized as planned, it possibly could have been better than the American space shuttles. The Burans had a greater payload. They were to have jet engines to assist them in landing. Soviet engineers also claim that their heat shield and fuselage contours were better than the competition’s.

The Buran could also fly automatically, as opposed to the space shuttle. The Americans installed the proper software for automated flight in the ’90s, but it was never used. The Energia rocket would have also been better than the space shuttle delivery system, as it was intended to be used for missions other than just delivering the Buran. The proposed variants showed more potential than their American counterpart.

In the end, the results of nearly two decades of time-intensive work by Soviet engineers, whose masterpiece was comparable or better than the Western counterpart, are rotting away forgotten. Only the main engines of the Energia were used to power commercial rocket Sea Launch. The rest of the program turned out to be a gargantuan waste.