Authors’ preface

This book is about the Energiya-Buran system, the Soviet equivalent of the US Space Shuttle. Originally conceived in 1976, Buran made its one and only flight in November 1988, more than seven years after the inaugural flight of the Space Shuttle. Prudent as the Soviet authorities were, it was conducted in an unmanned mode, a feat not accomplished by NASA in the Space Shuttle program.

Buran was not unique for being a manned spaceflight project that eventually would never carry a man into orbit. There were other Soviet programs that had suffered the same fate, such as the L-1/L-3 lunar program, and the military space station ferry TKS. Unlike these, however, from its conception Buran was a spacecraft without a clearly defined task. It was solely designed and built in response to the Space Shuttle, whose military potential was a source of major concern to the Soviet Union. Unsure what exactly the threat was, the Russians decided to build a vehicle matching the Shuttle’s capabilities to have a deterrent in the long run. From the Russian per­spective, Buran was just another product of the arms race between the superpowers.

The orbiter resembled its American counterpart to the point that they were aerodynamic twins, but there were important differences between the two systems as well. The most notable one was that Buran did not have main engines and was carried into orbit by a powerful launch vehicle (Energiya) that could be adapted for other missions as well. Despite the copying that unquestionably took place, the Russians still had to develop the technology, the materials, and the infrastructure all by themselves and in doing so often followed their own, unique approach. Building upon the lessons learned from their star-crossed manned lunar program, they brought the project to a state of maturity that allowed them to fly two successful launches of the Energiya rocket and one of the Buran orbiter. This was a remarkable feat, irrespective of whether the expenditures were justified or not.

After the maiden Buran flight in 1988, plans were drawn up for another mission in which the orbiter would again go up and land unmanned, although this time it would be briefly boarded in orbit by a visiting Soyuz crew. Only after the second mission had

proven the system to be reliable, would a crew have been allowed to be launched on board the orbiter.

Unfortunately, it would never come to that. As the Cold War drew to a close and the Soviet Union collapsed, the program largely lost its raison d’etre. In a time where funds allocated to large space undertakings were getting scarcer and scarcer, here was a program that was devouring more and more of that money. Slowly but surely, more and more space program officials began to oppose Buran, emphasizing that all this money was disappearing into a bottomless pit, without anyone being able to give a clear answer to that one question: what do we need Buran for?

Finally, the program died a silent death. It was never officially terminated by a government decree, but those who were involved knew the signs. The cosmonauts who had been training for the manned missions began returning to test flying in their respective institutes, transferred to the Soyuz and Mir program, or tried their luck in private industry.

Hardware was scrapped, stored, or offered for sale. The full-scale test model used for the approach and landing tests was sent to Sydney, where it was put on display. Later it was to be shipped to a museum in Germany, but didn’t make it beyond a junkyard in Bahrain, where it still sits at the time of writing.

Another full-scale test model ended up as a tourist attraction in Gorkiy Park in Moscow, while a third has been parked outdoors at Baykonur for several years, where it has been left exposed to the elements. The only Buran orbiter that flew in space was put in storage in the Energiya assembly building, but was totally destroyed when the building’s roof collapsed in May 2002.

In spite of the sad fates of these Buran orbiters, the program was a source of great pride for everyone who participated in it, from engineers to prospective cosmonauts. In many places models of the orbiter, or the entire vehicle, were erected, sometimes as monuments, sometimes just to embellish the streets in which they stand. As Buran’s lead test pilot Igor Volk says in his foreword and as maybe the ultimate sign of pride, many who were involved in it have the vehicle etched on their gravestones.

Despite cancellation of the project, the technology developed for it has not all disappeared down the drain. The rocket engine of Energiya’s strap-on boosters is still being used today by the Zenit rocket and its Sea Launch version and scaled-down versions of the engine currently power the first stage of America’s Atlas rockets and will also be employed in a new family of Russian launch vehicles called Angara. The docking hardware originally developed for Buran was used in the Shuttle/Mir pro­gram and is now actively used on the International Space Station.

Perhaps Buran was born under an unlucky star, but since the programm ended those who designed and built it have gone to a lot of trouble to make sure that the Soviet/Russian counterpart to the US Space Shuttle will be remembered as a state-of – the-art spaceship that was launched by one of the most powerful launch vehicles the world has ever seen. With this book, we hope we can contribute to that endeavor.

Bart Hendrickx

Mortsel

Belgium