Buran News

Back from my little trip in Russia I publish pictures of the space museums I visited. Here, it’s the museum of aviation and cosmonautic which is located in Moscow not far from the former airport.

Other museum’s pictures will come.

Here begin the visit.

During a meeting for the inauguration of a school, director of Roscomos, A.N. Perminov confirmed that there is no plans to revive the Buran project, nor develop a reusable system, at least like the Buran/Shuttle.

In accordance to the president of Roscosmos there is no plan to develop a reusable transport system even if the idea is interesting and it is necessary to continue researches in this field. But the way it was done on Buran and on the American Shuttle is detrimental because it implies important using costs and it is not secure.

The main point is the economical aspect, the cost of a launch of the American Shuttle is up to 0.5 billion of dollars, this is a lot of money even for a country like the United States.

The second point is about security, this spacecraft is not reliable at 100%, two accidents on the Shuttle showed it. Despite the hight level of design of Buran and the Shuttle, this is the same for Buran. This way has no advantage and is hazardous.

Ещё на один вопрос ответил А.Н. Перминов – о «Буране»: «Нет ли сегодня планов возрождения этого проекта или каких-то других проектов создания многоразовых пилотируемых космических кораблей?»
«Не хотелось вас огорчать, но лучше сразу сказать: нет, не планируем. Идея создания многоразовых космических кораблей сама по себе хорошая и будет использована дальше однозначно. Но как она была исполнена и на «Буране», и на американских шаттлах, она оказалась невыгодной из-за высокой стоимости обслуживания и ненадёжности.
Во-первых: экономический аспект. Стоимость запуска одного шаттла обходится НАСА до 0,5 млрд долларов. Это очень много даже для такой страны, как Америка.
Во-вторых: надёжность. Пока ещё не обеспечена 100-процентная надёжность кораблей многоразового использования, и 2 случая катастроф с шаттлами тому свидетельство. Несмотря на отличия в схеме компоновки «Бурана» и шаттлов, всё остальное на «Буране» то же самое – те же недостатки. Это направление оказалось невыгодным и опасным.

Source: http://www.federalspace.ru/main.php?id=2&nid=11499

Here are some pictures of Energia-M took at baikonur in 1991.

Those pictures are from a private collection.

Other pictures here.

Igor Volk (tests pilots chief of the Buran program) was at the Speyer museum (Germany) on last 8th May to receive the TM-19 Soyuz capsule and attend an autograph show in the new space building.

Pictures: Nicolas Pillet.

The new edition of the FCS magazine has arrived !

It is a little bit smaller than the number 1 but contains 106 pages where you will be able to read articles about the Apollo program and the Soviet exploration of the Moon through the Lunakhod rovers, there are interviews and also actualities articles notably with the mission on the ISS of Maxim Suraev.

You can download it here (in French).

Some days ago TV Roscosmos published a reporting about space planes, Spiral, BORs, and Buran, and their military implications. Their development were closely linked to the vision of Gleb Lozino Lozinsky (chief of the Buran project) which thought that space travels must be done aboard space planes.

The Moscow’s authorities will ask that the houses will be set with new energy-efficient technologies developped by the All-Russia Research Institute of Aviation Materials, reported the journalists last 20 march during a visit of this institut by the mayor Yuri Luzhkov.

The mayor specified that one of the most important task of the city is to insure a good energy control for heating houses and to promote the use of new technologies. He also added that in 2010 the city will spend more than 8 billion rubles about scientific development which is more than the previous year.

As the institut’s director Yevgeny Koblov said, the discussion will be about the use of materials, developped for the Buran project, to increase the thermal efficiency of the houses. According to him some agreement had already been settled. Moreover, said Koblov, Moscow is considering the utilisation of carbon fibers developped by the institut for the construction of buildings.

The All-Union Research Institute of Aviation Materials was created and attached to the ministry of heavy industry of the USSR in 1932, then to the governement of the Russian Federation.

Here is some pictures I took last summer at Tushino (suburbs of Moscow) where the second generation Buran OK-2.01 is stocked, we can see that she is in a pretty bad shape.