IN Lately The attention of the world press and public is focused on various new developments in our Russian space and space technology. Of course, this is primarily due to the geopolitical situation in the world and our cold relations with the leading countries of the world.
But in fact, such close attention is not entirely related to the events in Ukraine. It’s just that over the past 25 years the world has become accustomed to the fact that there is nothing to surprise Russia. But that's not true. Despite everything, our country did not stop developing the latest technology and moved towards its cherished goal of restoring its strength in the world arena of space technology and in the military industry.
And apparently we are finally beginning to restore our military and space potential. Our online publication tries to stay out of politics, but given the current situation, we still decided to digress a little and tell you today not about automotive technology, but about space technology, which in any case is always connected with politics.
In this area, we traditionally successfully compete with the United States. IN last years there is a lot of talk that our country has achieved success in the space industry only by copying technology from the Americans. But we decided to prove that this is not so using the example of two amazing spacecraft: the Russian Buran and the American Shuttle.
Our Russian space shuttle program arose as a response to the American Space Shuttle program. The thing is that at that moment our country's leadership saw the American space program as a threat national security. At the time, it was believed that the new American spacecraft were designed to deliver nuclear weapons through space to anywhere in the world.
As a result, our space program was of a military nature, as a result of which our developers created a huge number of amazing and amazing ideas, ranging from the creation of military bases to the creation of special stations for launching nuclear missiles.
Unfortunately, those who are little familiar with the history of the creation of Buran mistakenly believe that our Russian space shuttle is actually a copy of the Shuttle.
Why do people make this conclusion? Everything is very simple. They are guided by appearance as they both look alike. But their similarity is actually due to the peculiarity of the aerodynamic characteristics that should be used in these types of ships.
The same principle is used to create airplanes, submarines and other vehicles, which are also similar to each other. It's all business and no one can force them to act differently. It is because of this that engineers and developers cannot create a completely individual style for their designs.
Most likely, to develop Buran, our developers in any case used the external parameters of the Shuttle, but inside our Russian spacecraft was completely different, due to completely different technology.
To understand which space shuttle is better, you need to start comparing not only the appearance, but the design details. It is precisely at this moment that many people come to the understanding that the Russian “Buran” is superior to the Western shuttle.
First, let's compare the back of the Shuttle and Buran:
Have you noticed the difference? In the American Shuttle you see five. Two orbital maneuvering engines (OMS) and three large propulsion systems are used for launch. Buran, on the other hand, has only two engines for orbital maneuvering and many small engines for attitude control.
So what's the difference? The answer lies in the types of launch vehicles. The Shuttle is launched from the ground using three powerful engines, which propel the spacecraft to . To feed these voracious engines into outer space American ship a huge fuel tank is used, which is attached to the side of the Shuttle (a huge orange tank).
But it’s true that in order to lift the Shuttle into space, these three engines turned out to be not enough, since the weight of the ship + fuel creates too much load on the power units.
To help the shuttle's three main engines, American designers added two powerful solid rocket boosters (SRBs) for launch, which help the spacecraft's main engines overcome gravity. As a result, the design for launching the Shuttle into space is very complex, heavy and expensive.
After the Shuttle entered space, only the engines (OMS) were used for maneuvering. As a result, a huge fuel tank and two rocket launchers were not used in space and created useless ballast for the ship. As a result, this useless mass subsequently returned back to earth along with the shuttle. Agree, not the best solution.
For many uninitiated, it may seem that there is no other optimal way to launch such a ship into outer space. But in reality, nothing is impossible in the world. Our domestic developers took into account the inefficiency of the Shuttle and developed a unique technology for launching Buran into space.
In order to solve the problem of the ship's useless ballast, our engineers and scientists developed a rocket that ran on liquid fuel. It was she who played the role of launching our shuttle into orbit.
The rocket was called "Energia". As a result, it became the main ship for launching Buran into outer space. That is, our ship became a payload for Energia, and not the main ship. This solution allowed our developers to abandon the use of three engines, which are used on the Shuttle to launch the ship into outer space. This made it possible to reduce the weight of the Domestic ship by 8 tons.
As a result, due to its low weight, the Buran's carrying capacity significantly exceeded the American Shuttle. For example, the Shuttle could take on board a maximum of up to 25 tons (when flying from the ground to space) and up to 15 tons of cargo when descending to the ground.
Our Russian "Buran" could take on board a cargo weighing 30 tons during takeoff, and when descending from space it could carry up to 20 tons of cargo. As you can see, the difference in carrying capacity is colossal.
But the most important and main advantage of the Russian space shuttle program is that when developing Buran, our specialists, in fact, developed two spacecraft. For example, the Energia rocket could be used not only to launch the Buran into orbit.
The Energia rocket without Buran can deliver up to 95 tons of cargo into orbit. The most amazing thing is that in the States there is still no analogue of such a rocket. Only recently NASA began developing its own rocket, which will be created using the example of Energia.
In addition to the Energia rocket, the developers, based on this ship, also created the amazing Polyus ship, which was a warship equipped with a laser with a power of 1 megawatt. This missile was designed to destroy satellites in case of an attack on our country by an external enemy.
Unfortunately, during testing, the Polyus crashed while maneuvering. As a result, the prototype rocket burned up in the atmosphere. The technologies of Russian scientists of that time were impressive.
Do you know what other advantage of the Buran launch vehicle? Unlike the Shuttle, which is delivered using a rocket powered by solid fuel, Energia can be disconnected from thrust if necessary.
This became possible thanks to the use of liquid fuel in the rocket. For example, the Shuttle's launch vehicle cannot be de-powered if necessary. This is the main drawback of all solid fuel rockets.
NASA realized this after the Challenger space shuttle disaster. At the moment, the Americans are developing their own space rockets based on liquid fuel, but, nevertheless, the Soyuz spacecraft is still noticeably ahead of the rest, due to the use of liquid fuel , which is safer than solid.
In addition to safety, as we have already said, Buran had better carrying capacity, but that’s not all. Here is another main advantage of the Russian spacecraft.
When the Americans began testing the Shuttle in 1981, the whole world learned that the new spacecraft could accommodate two astronauts.
But when our country began testing Buran in 1988, the world community was shocked by the technologies of our space industry. The fact is that Buran was capable of being piloted without the participation of astronauts. For that time this was fantastic.
No, of course, “Buran” had the ability to accommodate astronauts, but the possibility of autonomous operation without the participation of people amazes experts even today. So, compared to the American shuttle, our Buran looks noticeably more advantageous.
The power of the Energia launch vehicle is 170,000,000 hp.
During the first experimental test flight of the Buran, the ship was launched into space, entered orbit, and then automatically landed on its own, like a regular plane on a runway. The Americans, of course, could not even dream of such a ship.
This feature of the Buran's operation made it possible to send a ship into space without passengers. For example, to save astronauts who are in distress in space. Pilot-cosmonauts could easily transfer to the Buran and descend to the ground. The Shuttle did not provide such an opportunity due to the limited capacity of astronauts and the inability of autonomous flight.
To summarize, we would like to note that our Russian Energia-Buran program has achieved much more on the technological side compared to NASA. And this despite the fact that the Americans began to develop the Shuttle program much earlier than our country.
Unfortunately, these days both Russian and US programs have been curtailed. But in an ideal world, both countries could continue to cooperate in the space industry, and by exchanging technology, perhaps could speed up the expedition to Mars.
But this is still a long way off, although our country, despite disagreements on many issues, continues to cooperate with the United States in the space field.
But the world doesn't work the way we want.
On November 15, 1988, the Buran reusable spacecraft was launched. After the launch of the universal rocket and space transport system"Energia" with "Buran", it entered orbit, made two orbits around the Earth and made an automatic landing at the Baikonur Cosmodrome.
This flight was an outstanding breakthrough in Soviet science and opened new stage in the development of the Soviet space research program.
The fact that in the Soviet Union it is necessary to create a domestic reusable space system that would serve as a counterweight in the policy of containing potential adversaries (Americans) was revealed by analytical studies carried out by the Institute of Applied Mathematics of the USSR Academy of Sciences and NPO Energia (1971-1975). The result was the assertion that if the Americans launch the reusable Space Shuttle system, they will gain an advantage and the ability to launch nuclear missile strikes. And although the American system did not pose an immediate threat at that time, it could threaten the country's security in the future.
Work on the creation of the Energia-Buran program began in 1976. About 2.5 million people took part in this process, representing 86 ministries and departments, as well as about 1,300 enterprises throughout the Soviet Union. To develop the new spacecraft, NPO Molniya was specially created, headed by G.E. Lozino-Lozinsky, who already in the 60s worked on the reusable rocket and space system Spiral. 
It should also be noted that, despite the fact that the ideas for creating spaceships-airplanes were first expressed by the Russians, namely Friedrich Zander back in 1921, domestic designers were in no hurry to bring his ideas to life, since this matter seemed to them extremely troublesome . True, work was carried out on the construction of the Planning Spacecraft, however, due to emerging technical problems all work was stopped.
But work on creating winged spaceships began to be carried out only in response to the start of such work by the Americans. 
So, when in the 60s in the USA work began on creating the Dyna-Soar rocket plane, the USSR began work on creating the R-1, R-2, Tu-130 and Tu-136 rocket planes. But the greatest success of Soviet designers was the Spiral project, which was to become the harbinger of Buran.
From the very beginning, the program to create a new spacecraft was torn apart by conflicting demands: on the one hand, the designers were required to copy the American Shuttle in order to reduce possible technical risks, reduce the time and cost of development, on the other hand, the need to adhere to the program put forward by B .Glushko about the creation of unified rockets intended for landing an expedition on the surface of the Moon.
During the formation appearance"Buran" was offered two options. The first option was similar to the American Shuttle and was a horizontal landing aircraft with engines located in the tail. The second option was a wingless design with a vertical landing; its advantage was that it was possible to reduce design time by using data from the Soyuz spacecraft. 
As a result, after testing, a horizontal landing scheme was adopted as the basis, since it most fully met the requirements. The payload was located on the side, and the second stage propulsion engines were located in the central block. The choice of this location was due to the lack of confidence that short time it will be possible to create a reusable hydrogen engine, as well as the need to preserve a full-fledged launch vehicle, which could independently launch into orbit not only a ship, but also large volumes of payloads. If we look a little ahead, we note that such a decision was completely justified: Energia was able to ensure the launch of large-sized vehicles into orbit (it was 5 times more powerful than the Proton launch vehicle and 3 times more powerful than the Space Shuttle).
The first and only singing of “Burana,” as we said above, took place in 1988. The flight was carried out in unmanned mode, that is, there was no crew on it. It should be noted that, despite the external similarity with the American Shuttle, the Soviet model had a number of advantages. First of all, what distinguished these ships was that the domestic one could launch into space, in addition to the ship itself, additional cargo, and also had greater maneuverability during landing. The shuttles were designed in such a way that they landed with their engines turned off, so they could not try again if necessary. "Buran" was equipped with turbojet engines, which provided such an opportunity in case of bad weather conditions. weather conditions or any unforeseen situations. In addition, the Buran was equipped with an emergency crew rescue system. At a low altitude, the cockpit with pilots could be ejected, and at high altitudes it was possible to disconnect the module from the launch vehicle and make an emergency landing. Another significant difference was the automatic flight mode, which was not available on American ships. 
It should also be noted that Soviet designers We had no illusions about the cost-effectiveness of the project - according to calculations, launching one Buran would cost the same as launching hundreds of disposable rockets. However, the Soviet ship was originally developed as a military space system. After the end of the Cold War, this aspect ceased to be relevant, which cannot be said about spending. Therefore, his fate was sealed.
In general, the program to create the multi-purpose spacecraft "Buran" provided for the creation of five ships. Of these, only three were constructed (the construction of the rest had only just begun, but after the program was closed, all the groundwork for them was destroyed). The first of them visited space, the second became an attraction in the Moscow Gorky Park, and the third is in the museum of technology in Sinsheim, Germany. 
But first, technological mock-ups (9 in total) were created in full size, which were intended for strength testing and crew training.
It should also be noted that almost enterprises from all over the Soviet Union took part in the creation of Buran. Thus, at the Kharkov Energopribor, an autonomous control complex for Energia was created, which launched the ship into space. The Antonov ASTC carried out the design and manufacture of parts for the ship and also created the An-225 Mriya, which was used to deliver the Buran.
To test the Buran spacecraft, 27 candidates were trained, who were divided into military and civilian test pilots. This division was caused by the fact that this ship was planned to be used not only for defense purposes, but also for the needs National economy. Colonel Ivan Bachurin and experienced civilian pilot Igor Vovk were appointed leaders of the group (this was the reason why his group was called the “wolf pack”). 
Despite the fact that the Buran flight was carried out in automatic mode, seven testers still managed to go into orbit, however, on other ships: I. Vovk, A. Levchenko, V. Afanasyev, A. Artsebarsky, G. Manakov, L. Kadenyuk, V. Tokarev. Unfortunately, many of them are no longer among us.
The civilian detachment lost more testers - the testers, continuing preparations for the Buran program, simultaneously tested other aircraft, flew and died one after another. O. Kononenko was the first to die. A. Levchenko followed him. A little later, A. Shchukin, R. Stankyavichus, Y. Prikhodko, Y. Sheffer also passed away.
Commander I. Vovk himself, having lost so many people close to him, left flying service in 2002. And a few months later, trouble happened to the Buran ship itself: it was damaged by debris from the roof of one of the installation and testing buildings at the Baikonur Cosmodrome, where the ship was in storage. 
In some media you can find information that there were actually two Buran flights, but one was unsuccessful, so information about it is classified. Thus, in particular, it is said that in 1992, another ship similar to Buran, the Baikal, was launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, but in the first seconds of the flight an engine malfunction occurred. The automation worked, the ship began to return back.
In fact, everything is explained extremely simply. In 1992, all work on Buran was stopped. As for the name, the ship was originally called “Baikal”, but the top Soviet leadership did not like it, who recommended changing it to a more sonorous one – “Buran”. At least, this is what G. Ponomarev, commander of the engineering and testing department of the Baikonur Cosmodrome, who was directly involved in the program, claims.
To this day, disputes have not subsided as to whether Buran was needed at all, and why it was necessary to spend such a huge amount of money on a project that is not even used now. But be that as it may, for that time it was a real breakthrough in space science, and even today it has not yet been possible to surpass it.
Because Soviet military strategists believed that the Americans had installed weapons on the Space Shuttle, the Buran orbiter was designed to be equipped with high-tech lasers or ammunition for missiles and space mines.
But 15 years after the final closure of the project, which took place in 1993 and marked the end of the most ambitious and costly phase of the confrontation, Buran is making a much more peaceful journey to “retire.”
This car once took just 100 minutes to circle the Earth, but now it chugs along the Rhine aboard a barge at approximately 5 miles per hour.
Buran is being transported to Speyer in southwestern Germany, where it is due to arrive on Friday. It will be unloaded on site and installed in the city's Museum of Technology. It will be a wonderful addition to the exhibition there.
Museum director Hermann Leicher is confident that thisthe exhibition will be "the most exciting in Europe."“This is a dream for our museum,” said spokeswoman Corinne Handrich. “It will be a major exhibit.”
“There are crowds of people gathering along the banks of the river,” Handrich said. The Buran, which was believed in the Soviet Union to have corrected many of the Shuttle's design flaws, now appears to be not as modern a vehicle as it once was.
Over time, the white thermally insulating ceramic tiles acquired a slightly sloppy appearance, and the ship itself was stripped of its tail during the river voyage.
According to some reports, the Speyer Museum of Technology had to pay up to 7 million pounds for the Buran.In total, eight full-size mock-ups (not counting the wooden one) and five flight samples were manufactured as part of the Buran program. It so happened that a place outside the project was found specifically for the first two layouts. "Buran" 1M (OK-M), which was used for static strength and frequency tests, was sold by NPO Molniya back in 1995 as an attraction. Even now (but only in summer time) works in the capital's Gorky Park.
The fate of the second model, or rather the Buran analogue aircraft BTS-002 (he is our “hero”) turned out to be even more interesting. As part of the Buran program, it was used for flight tests in the Earth's atmosphere: from 1985 to 1988, the device carried out 24 flights at the Gromov Flight Test Institute in Zhukovsky. After the cessation of work on Buran, the aircraft was demonstrated several times at the MAKS air show, until finally, in 1999, it was leased for nine years to the Australian company Buran Space Corporation (BSC). Transportation of BTS-002 from Moscow to Sydney cost $700 thousand, it was shown here at the 2000 Olympics, but the Australian project did not pay off.
After this, through the mediation of the American company First FX, Buran was offered to an aviation museum in Michigan, but the ship turned out to be not only expensive for them, but also too large an exhibit. BTS-002 was put up for auction organized by Los Angeles radio station News 980 KFWB AM. Its starting price was $6 million and, apparently, that’s why there was no buyer for the rarity. BTS-002 was leased to a certain Singaporean company, which took it to the first flight festival in Bahrain (2002). Negotiations were held about showing a similar aircraft in Malaysia, Singapore, China, Japan and the Philippines, but things did not go beyond words. The model of the Buran remained in Bahrain, and recently journalists from Dusseldorf, working on reports from the Formula 1 competition, accidentally discovered a Soviet shuttle in the port. Soon, the director of the Technical Museum in the German city of Sinsheim, Michael Walter, told Der Spiegel magazine that the museum acquired this ship from the NPO Molniya. AND , after four and a half years of legal battles, the Buran was dismantled in 2008 and transported to Rotterdam.
Upon arrival in Speyer, it will be placed in a specially built hangar, where it can be viewed this summer.
The museum’s costs are a drop in the bucket compared to the billions of rubles and millions of man-hours that Soviet Union has invested in the shuttle project since its launch in the 70s.
What do we have:
The real "Buran" - the same one that flew into space in 1988 - was sad for a long time at Baikonur. And in the end he died the death of the brave: in 2002, the roof of the installation and testing complex collapsed on him.
Another test sample became an attraction in the capital's Park. Gorky. There are several more full-size models, but they are located in the far corners of space enterprises and are inaccessible to the public; it seems that they decided for us that we have nothing to be proud of.
Fate:
The Buran cabin module, which was used for medical research, was for some time located at the capital’s clinical hospital No. 29, and now it is at the Cosmonaut Training Center. In principle, no one uses it either, although it does not bother anyone.
Another mock-up, more precisely the full-size main compartment of the Buran OK-TVA, on which thermal and vibration strength tests were carried out, stands at TsAGI in Zhukovsky. As Evgeniy Kalyaev, an employee of the institute, explained to Gazeta.Ru, “all the tests were completed in full, so there is no reason for us to continue to have the prototype.” “The compartment occupies a room, and we have already written to NPO Molniya asking them to take it back, but, as you can see, there is no result,” he said.
But the company does not plan to part with the Buran OK-TVI cargo compartment, which is located in the assembly building of NIIKhimmash (Peresvet village, Sergiev Posad district). “We are not going to cut it down and are sure that this rarity will become part of the exhibition of the future Central Museum of Aerospace Technology,” Boris Gavrikov, deputy director of NIIKhimmash, told Gazeta.Ru.
With the Burans stationed at Baikonur, nothing is clear at all. They are the property of Kazakhstan, and according to unofficial information, they were allegedly sold to commercial structures.
In the 80th building (installation and refueling building, site 112a) of the cosmodrome there are two ships at once. This is an OK-MT prototype, on which pure strength tests were carried out, and the second surviving flight copy of the Buran. It was supposed to fly in 1991 and dock with the Mir station. By the way, by 1993 its readiness was estimated at 95–97%, while the flight model of NPO Molniya, which is now docked in Moscow, was only 30–50% ready.
On the open site No. 254 of complex fire tests there is another mock-up of the Buran OK-ML1. It was used for clean strength tests. Gazeta.Ru was unable to find out who these models actually belong to and what awaits them in the future. The economic attache of the Kazakh Embassy in Russia promised the Gazeta.Ru correspondent to find out the situation with the ships, but by the time this material was submitted he had not gotten in touch.
At the same time, one of the museum specialists involved in the history of cosmonautics said that the Saratov governor Dmitry Ayatskov was going to buy Buran for the regional museum. According to Gazeta.Ru’s interlocutor, “they collected the necessary money for this, but it turned out that Buran no longer belongs to Kazakhstan, but to some joint-stock company ( joint stock company. – “Gazeta.Ru”).” So the purchase of the ship allegedly fell through.
And finally, it is worth remembering that the fate of three more flight models has long been decided. The first Buran with the number 11F35 - the only one that had the opportunity to fly into space - died on May 12, 2002 under the collapsed roof of the 112th site of Baikonur. The 4K copy was disassembled on stocks in the workshops of the Tushinsky Machine-Building Plant before 1996. The reserve of the last fifth airborne Buran was also destroyed there.
The press service of the Russian Air Force told Gazeta.Ru that “the Moninsky Aviation Museum is happy to see any rare aerospace equipment, but as usual, it all comes down to money.” One of the museum specialists, in turn, explained that “Buran” can only be taken to the Museum of Cosmonautics in Moscow or the Tsiolkovsky Museum of the History of Cosmonautics in Kaluga, but even there storage is possible only in an open area. And this, you understand, is detrimental to such technology.”
In addition, according to the interlocutor of Gazeta.Ru, the mock-ups and flight prototypes that have been preserved in Russia need to be well restored before being exhibited, but this is a lot of money, which Russian state museums do not have. “Perhaps the future will really be interested in Buranami National Museum cosmonautics on the Khodynskoye field, but we still have to live until then,” summed up the museum specialist. In the meantime, while the attractions of Gorky Park are closed for the winter, the unique “Buran” can be viewed through the fence of the pier of the Khimki Reservoir in Tushino.
Historical reference:
Work on the Energia-Buran program began in 1976.
86 ministries and departments and 1286 enterprises throughout the USSR (about 2.5 million people in total) took part in the creation of this system.
The lead developer of the ship was the specially created NPO Molniya. Production has been carried out at the Tushinsky Machine-Building Plant since 1980; by 1984 the first full-scale copy was ready. From the plant, the ships were delivered by water transport to the city of Zhukovsiy, and from there (from the airfield) by air (on a special VM-T transport aircraft) to the Baikonur cosmodrome.
and after flying around the Earth, he landed at the specially equipped Yubileiny airfield at Baikonur. The flight took place without a crew, in fully automatic mode, unlike the shuttle, which can only land using manual control.
In 1990, work on the Energia-Buran program was suspended, and in 1993 the program was finally closed. 
The END
Buran is a Soviet reusable space orbital vehicle.
After the Americans built their shuttle, the Soviet leadership, having learned about its ability to easily hit any target in the Soviet Union, immediately ordered the creation of an analogue.
And in 1976, NPO Molniya was created, where G.E. Lozino-Lozinsky, who had previously been involved in the creation of another Soviet reusable aerospace system “Spiral” in the 60s, was appointed chief developer. The first copy was built in 1984, and on November 15, 1988 Buran made his first last flight. Interestingly, this flight was completely automatic; this was even noted in the Guinness Book of Records.
The Buran's body was made of special heat-resistant materials, and the cabin was solid, that is, it had no welds or other components. The cabin volume was 70 cubic meters. Buran was also capable of transporting a crew of up to 10 people and cargo weighing up to 30 tons.
Buran had a delta wing with double sweep. As well as other aerodynamic elements necessary when landing the car - ailerons, rudder and aerodynamic flap.
The Buran was equipped with two groups of engines for maneuvering, located in the front of the hull and at the end of the tail section.
Since Baikonur was located at a different point on the Earth than Cape Canaveral, when launched into space from Baikonur, the rockets should be more powerful than when launched from Canaveral. Therefore, when developing the launch vehicle, Soviet designers went their own way. 
Buran was lifted into space by a two-stage Energia launch vehicle. The first stage consisted of 4 side blocks with oxygen-kerosene four-chamber RD-170 engines, which were reusable. The second stage, the largest and main part of the launch vehicle, was equipped with four RD-0120 oxygen-hydrogen engines. Unfortunately, the second stage was disposable, which significantly increased the price of Buran. First, both stages of the launch vehicle were launched, then the first stage was undocked and the second stage carried out the final launch into Buran orbit. This made it possible not to use engines on Buran, and made it possible, unlike the American shuttle, to carry out a fully manned landing, with the possibility of a go-around approach.
Buran was also equipped with a catapult capable of rescuing the crew at low altitudes, which the American shuttle did not have.
Despite everything, the project was closed in 1993 due to its high cost. By the time the program was closed, 5 copies of Buran had been built or were under construction.
Product 1.01 "Buran" - made an unmanned flight into space. But in 2002, it was destroyed along with the Energia launch vehicle when the roof of the Assembly and Testing Building, where they were stored, collapsed. Was the property of Kazakhstan.
Product 1.02 “Storm” - was supposed to make a second flight and dock with space station"World". IN this moment be on display at the Baikonur Cosmodrome Museum. It is the property of Kazakhstan.
Product 2.01 - by the time the program was closed, it was 50% ready. Until 2004, it was in the workshops of the Tushinsky Machine-Building Plant, and was subsequently transported to the pier of the Khimki Reservoir for temporary storage.
Product 2.02 – was 10-15% ready. Subsequently, it was dismantled on the stocks of the Tushinsky Machine-Building Plant.
Product 2.03 - the machine was immediately destroyed after the program was closed in the workshops of the Tushinsky Machine-Building Plant.
Characteristics of the Buran space orbital ship:
Length – 36.4 m
Height – 16 m
Wingspan – 24 m
Launch weight – 105 tons
Load capacity:
at start - 30 tons
upon landing – 20 tons
Speed:
upon entry into the atmosphere - 30,000 km/h
when landing 300 km/h
Crew – up to 10 people
Produced – 5 pcs.
To create a glider for the Buran orbital ship on the basis of three design bureaus (Molniya Design Bureau, Burevestnik Design Bureau and the Experimental Machine-Building Plant headed by general designer Vladimir Myasishchev) established a specialized enterprise - the research and production association "Molniya". The Tushino Machine-Building Plant was chosen as the main production base. The new association was headed by Gleb Lozino-Lozinsky, who back in the 1960s worked on the Spiral reusable aerospace system project.
Currently, several mock-ups and flight copies have been preserved.
The flying ship "Buran" was mothballed and left in the installation and testing building at the Baikonur Cosmodrome (Kazakhstan). In 2002, the ship was completely destroyed when the hull roof collapsed on it.
The second ship, which was supposed to fly in automatic mode with docking with the manned Mir station, remained at Baikonur. In April 2007, it was installed in the exhibition of the Baikonur Cosmodrome Museum. It is the property of Kazakhstan.
The third ship (the degree of readiness of the ship at the time of cessation of work was 30-50%) until 2004 was in the workshops of the Tushinsky Machine-Building Plant, in October 2004 it was transported to the pier of the Khimki Reservoir for temporary storage. In June 2011, it was transported by river transport to the airfield in the city of Zhukovsky for restoration and subsequent display at the International Aviation and Space Salon (MAKS-2011).
After the air show, a mock-up of the spacecraft is in one of the pavilions of the Ramenskoye (Zhukovsky) airfield.
After the closure of the Molniya program in 1993, one of the Buran models, Buran BTS-002, was demonstrated at the air show of the International Aviation and Space Salon. In 1999, the model was leased to an Australian company for display on Olympic Games in Sydney, and then to a Singaporean company, which took him to Bahrain. In 2003, NPO Molniya sold Buran BTS-002 to the private Technical Museum in Speyer (Germany), where it arrived on April 12, 2008. It is currently installed as an exhibit in the Speyer Technical Museum.
Another full-size mock-up of Buran (BTS-001), which was used to test the air transportation of the orbital complex, was leased to the Space-Earth society in 1993. "Buran" was installed in Moscow on the Pushkinskaya embankment of the Moscow River in the Central Park of Culture and Leisure named after Gorky, and a scientific and educational attraction was organized there. Now it is one of the attractions of the park.
The material was prepared based on information from RIA Novosti and open sources