The Story of Baikonur, Russia's Space City

eldavojohn writes "There's an article up on Physorg about Russian space launch city Baikonur, rented by Russia from Kazakhstan. Although it is essentially the same as it was in the 60's and 70's, it is amazingly efficient and still operational. 'Even the technology hasn't changed much. The Soyuz spacecraft designed in the mid-1960s is still in service, somewhat modified. It can only be used once, but costs just $25 million. The newest Endeavor space shuttle cost $2 billion, but is reusable. Life and work in Baikonur and its cosmodrome are also pretty much what they were in the Soviet era. The town of 70,000 - unbearably hot in summer, freezing cold in winter and dusty year round - is isolated by hundreds of miles of scrubland.'" We last discussed Baikonur back in 2005.

Comments

Costs

[stoolpigeon]

This Nasa space shuttle faq lists endeavour's cost at 1.7 billion. Maybe they just rounded off, but a third of a billion seems significant to me.

It also lists the launch costs for a shuttle at about $450 million. I don't know if that's just the launch itself or if that includes the turn around costs. Of course - the article doesn't list similar numbers for the Soyuz - but it seems that while reusable - the shuttle still is exponentially more expensive. Although - I don't know of anything else that can get as much weight to orbit as the shuttle.

Re:Costs

[slashqwerty]

I don't know of anything else that can get as much weight to orbit as the shuttle.

At 21,000 kg to LEO, the Ariane 5 ECA comes pretty close. And it does a lot better than the shuttle to Geostationary Transfer Orbit. The Delta IV does slightly better than the shuttle at 25,800kg to LEO versus the shuttle's 24,400kg.

The Saturn V could put them all to shame. Although the planned Ares V can carry even more than the Saturn V.

Re:Costs

[XNormal]

I think you may be mixing up the Soyuz launcher with the Soyuz spacecraft.

The launcher can lift 7,800 kg to LEO.

Re:Bargain space flight

[CharlieG]

Remember the MAIN design goal of the shuttle wasn't JUST to bring "stuff" to orbit, but to be able to bring sats DOWN from orbit - in fact, part of the design criteria was launch from Vandenburg, grab a sat, and LAND in ONE orbit (Military wanted to be able to snach Sats)

They did bring 2 or 3 Sats down from orbit in the early days

Re:Reusable shuttle? Not really ..

[glitchvern]

For example, by the time the shuttle engines are on the launch pad, they've been rebuilt pretty much from scratch and retested, which takes up almost 90% of their rated lifetime. Is this still true? I know at the beginning of the shuttle program this was true, but that was about 5 major space shuttle main engine versions ago. Phase II engines first flew September 29, 1988 (STS-26 first post Challenger flight); Block 1 engines first flew July 13, 1995 (STS-70); Block IIa engines first flew January 22, 1998 (STS-89); Block II engines, which yes came after Block IIa engines, first flew July 12 2001 (STS-104) Boeing SSME paper. From 1992 to 2000 Space Shuttle annual operating costs decreased 40% Nasa Fact Sheet in part due to decreased SSME maintenance costs. How much does it costs to rebuild a Block II SSME? I can't find any numbers for that anywhere. It should be noted that a Block II SSME is the most reliable rocket engine ever built in large part because it's reuseability allows extensive static fire testing of each engine. The space shuttle may be crap, but a lot of the parts are awesome and SSME is one of them. It'll be a shame we will no longer use them when we discontinue the space shuttle, but attaching expensive reusable engines to an expendable booster really doesn't make a lot of sense.