![]() ![]() Read more about the space race here, the Ekranoplan, the colossal Soviet aquatic plane, or shop our space themed posters below. Now, they attract urban explorers who secretly hike 35 km through the desert to photograph yesterday's race to send humans to space. ![]() It’s a rather unceremonious end for these abandoned icons of the Soviet space program. The final shuttle is rotting away in an abandoned hangar in another part of Baikonur. In 2002, the roof of the hangar housing another Buran shuttle collapsed after an earthquake, killing eight people and destroying the second space shuttle. A full-scale test model is on display at the Baikonur Cosmodrome Museum. Today, just two Buran space shuttles survive. The Buran program was one of the most expensive projects ever undertaken by the Soviet Union and was widely viewed as a waste of resources and a distraction from more important projects, such as the Mir space station and the Energia rocket. The unmanned mission deployed and then retrieved a satellite and orbited the Earth twice before landing on a runway at Baikonur. The maiden, and only, orbital launch was made without a crew. Titov left his career as a cosmonaut to become a test pilot for the program. The Buran was extensively tested in Earth's atmosphere by test pilots, including German Titov, the second person to orbit the Earth. “ Soviet space officials, acknowledging the similarities, contend that they are inevitable because both shuttles were designed to serve much the same function: ferrying people and cargo into low Earth orbit, then returning to a runway landing.” Some American scientists suggested espionage was at play. The similarity in appearance to NASA's Space Shuttles was not accidental. Like the Space Shuttle, the Buran had engines located at its back, and two wings for a controlled landing back on Earth. “ Designers and managers believed that such a craft ultimately would provide more reliable and efficient access to space than single-use rockets.” The Buran prompted the United States to accelerate their own program, and invest more espionage and reconnaissance to gather information about their Soviet counterparts. The goal was to create a reusable spacecraft that could be launched into orbit like a rocket and then land on a runway like a plane. The Soviet Union announced the Buran program as a response to the American Space Shuttle program. The Blizzard is BornĪs the Cold War thawed, the space race was still burning red hot. A year after its launch, the Berlin Wall fell and the USSR collapsed. Its a remnant of the USSR’s failed effort at building a reusable space shuttle as part of the Buran Program. Sadly, only one shuttle of three ever partook in a mission. The collapse of the Soviet Union caused the demise of this facility in 1993. ![]() The Buran, Russian for "blizzard", was once the future of the Soviet space program. The Buran Shuttle Program was halted in 1988 but the hangar was operational until 1993 and was the home to three of the most advanced pieces of technology of their time. This little-known chapter in the Cold War space race saw the Soviets build their own version of NASA's Space Shuttle to challenge the USA for space supremacy. Eight people died, the first orbiter was destroyed and the second orbiter (OK-1K2) was moved to the Assembly and Fueling Complex pictured in Mirebs' essay.On November 15, 1988, the Soviet Union's first reusable space shuttle, the Buran, launched in what is now present-day Kazakhstan. 'Air and Space Ship'), 1 was a Soviet and later Russian reusable spacecraft project that began in 1974 at the Central. Boris Yeltsin canceled the program in 1993 after the fall of communism, and the building that the orbiter was stored in collapsed during a 2002 earthquake. The Buran programme ( Russian:, IPA: bran, 'Snowstorm', 'Blizzard'), also known as the ' VKK Space Orbiter programme ' ( Russian: -, lit. Following one unmanned space flight in November 1988 - in which Orbiter (OK)-1K1 made two orbits - the program fell victim to budget cuts. Mirebs' photography covers a range of underground and military locations around the world.Īccording to Ars Technica, the Buran (Russian for “Blizzard”) program differed from NASA’s shuttle in that it used the Energia heavy-lift rocket for takeoff rather than the main engines used by NASA. Photographer Ralph Mirebs was able to capture the derelict hangar at Kazakhstan’s Baikonur Cosmodrome that houses the Buran orbiter in a photo essay on his website. The abandoned Soviet space shuttle program created as a response to NASA’s own program has been revealed in a series of images. The Assembly and Fueling Complex, housing the Soviet Buran orbiter OK-1K2. ![]()
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