Soviet Shuttle Buran Found In a Junk Heap

gruenz noted the somewhat sad photo slideshow showing what appears to be the Soviet Space Shuttle Buran, lying in a Moscow suburb junk heap. Of course I don't read Russian, so it might also be a carnival ride rusting.

Comments

Re:Which one is it?

[hcdejong]

Wikipedia has a better list, it seems. Most likely candidate is orbiter 2.02:

At the time of the halting of the Buran-Energia program, Buran 2.02 was under construction on the factory floor at the Tushino Machine Building Plant just outside of Moscow. Her level of completion was estimated between 10-20 percent.

With funding gone, Buran 2.02 remained unfinished on the factory floor for a number of years. Recently she has been dismantled and moved outside to the back of the premises. She now lies exposed to the elements. Many of her tiles have since been stripped, such as those shown below can now be bought on the internet.

Amazing...

[advocate_one]

slashdot having problems... target website holding fine... "In Soviet Russia, Buran slashdots you..."

Re:The caption says it is Buran.

[Em Ellel]

Google translate says:

And unprecedented case. Seemingly abandoned spaceship on the streets of Moscow - it is something from the realm of fantasy. But alas, this is the true reality. Correspondent "MK" discovered orbiting Soviet "Buran" play like garbage on the outskirts of the capital. Nobody cares what was once a symbol of cosmic power of our country.

Surprisingly close to accurate.

Actual translation:

"Sometimes impossible is possible. You would think that an abandoned spaceship lying on the streets of Moscow is something out of science fiction, but unfortunately this is reality. A Correspondent of "MK" discovered a soviet orbiter "Buran" lying like trash in the capital's suburbs. Nobody cares about what once was a symbol of the space might of our country"

(And yes, "Buran" is not a name of a ship, its a type of ship.)

Re:They should be thankful

[samkass]

That they did not spend a crazy amount of money on what ended up in the U.S. as a net negative to what we COULD of had

In many ways, Buran was what the US could have had. It had no SSMEs, which remain one of the most complex engine systems ever built. It had no solid rocket boosters, which caused Challenger's demise and severely limited the failure modes of the vehicle. And it could be operated entirely by computer and remote control, meaning for many missions no crew or their equipment need consume launch weight.

It lacked capabilities that Shuttle had, but it was a pretty reasonable compromise that would have probably had significantly higher return on investment.