Preparing Buran

The orbiter for the first space mission (vehicle 1K, mission 1K1) arrived at the Baykonur cosmodrome on a VM-T carrier aircraft on 11 December 1985. Although eventually called Buran, it had the name Baykal painted on its side until at least April 1988 (see Chapter 2). The MIK OK orbiter-processing building on Site 254 was only 50/60 percent ready, with only one of the five bays (bay 104) available. The decision to send Buran to Baykonur so early came in an apparent response to the August 1985 government/party decree calling for a maiden mission in late 1986. The move was also designed to stimulate and speed up work at Baykonur. For the same purpose MOM minister Oleg Baklanov flew to Baykonur in January 1986 and set up three teams to prepare for the flight: the first team (headed by Yuriy Semyonov) had to ensure that Buran was ready for flight in the third quarter of 1987, the second team (led by Boris Gubanov) had to concentrate on readiness of Energiya-Buran as a whole, and the third team (led by Baklanov’s deputy S. S. Vanin) focused on readying

launch facilities and other ground equipment. Between January and March 1986 the number of people working at the Buran processing facility rose from a mere 60 to 1,800.

Not only the Buran facilities but also the orbiter itself was far from ready when it arrived at the cosmodrome. This was related not only to the earlier than planned shipping date, but also to the limited payload capacity of the VM-T aircraft. Many systems needed for orbital flight as well as major components such as the vertical stabilizer and landing gear had not yet been installed. Furthermore, only 70 percent of the thermal protection tiles had been installed, making it necessary to set up a special tile-manufacturing facility in the Buran processing facility.

In the summer of 1987 leading program officials were invited to attend a meeting of the Defense Council, the supreme decision-making body on national security issues. Chaired by General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachov, it included the highest party and military officials in the Soviet Union such as the Minister of Defense and the Minister of Foreign Affairs. At the meeting, the officials pledged to launch Buran in the first quarter of 1988, although some (including Boris Gubanov) privately had strong doubts the orbiter would make that target date [36]. Presumably, Soviet space officials were under pressure to launch Buran before the post-Challenger return to flight of the US Space Shuttle, then planned for June 1988.

Final assembly of Buran was not officially completed until 15 October 1987, after which the vehicle was transferred to MIK OK’s control and test bay for electric tests and to the anechoic chamber for tests of the radio systems. It had already spent some time in those bays before completion of assembly to uncover any potential problems at an early stage. On 15 February 1988 preparations began for test firings of the ODU propulsion system and the Auxiliary Power Units at the orbiter test-firing stand,

located in open air right next to the MIK OK. On the whole, the tests, conducted between 25 April and 9 May, produced satisfactory results. During the two weeks that Buran spent outdoors, several communication tests were carried out between the orbiter and Mission Control in Kaliningrad near Moscow using relay satellites.