What Happened To Russia’s Space Shuttle Program?

Originally posted by weedwhacker
What do you think?

Me? I think the Russians have always had one up on us....

And your just miffed because Buran doesn't need a PILOT Something the USAF has taken up on with the x-37B NO PILOT needed

Even Newt says they were ahead of us as late as

Book Titled "High Frontier"
Subtitle "There is a defense against Nuclear War"
by General Daniel O.Graham Former Deputy Director of the CIA
It was written in 1983, published by Tom Doherty Associates,Inc. 8-10 West 36th Street, New York, New York, 10018

On the first page is a quote by Congressman Newt Gingrich...

By Newt Gingrich
" . . . He who Controls Space may well control the future of Mankind. We have a chance, through High Frontier, using existing technology to develop a space program that is absolutely necessary to our survival and that will give us a chance to move past the Russians to assure our own nation and freedom a future on this planet"

So in 1983 a Congressman states we MAY finally be able to move past the Russians.

Maybe if NASA stops spending MILLIONS to design a pen that works in space... while the practical Russian say a pencil works just fine... we MIGHT have a chance

But heck NASA is doomed, Obama told them NO to go back to the Moon and Mars not till at least 2030 while Russia has an assembly line going for Progress and Soyuz ships


Credit: Zvezda

ESA uses Russian ships....
This pic from Atlantis shows 2 Soyuz TMA's and a Progress freighter at ISS (ESA mission 9 docking)


Robert Bigelow uses Russian ships for his space station Genesis

Sundancer Bigelow Aerospace

That Spiral? Yep they built it

reply to post by SLAYER69


Right now Mama is too busy to read your thread.
I will give you a star and flag because I know it
will be another great thread.You're the best Slayer!

Good thread as usual slayer!

Was unaware of most of this info.

Thanx to zorgon for the additional links also!

By the way,just love that Antonov! Awesome machine!

Always a fascinating subject, the Buran.

A few years ago, a found some exterior tiles from it on sale on ebay...whether or not they were real who knows (?)

Also, you can find one on Google Earth close to a river in Moscow, not sure of exact location, on display.

The Black Russians and the Black Horse

That title and the search that was taken from is where Pegasus Research was born... here at ATS It came about seeking secret spaceships, weapons in space and cloaking capabilities. One of the things the skeptics said "They would NEVER paint ships black"

Well that is wrong

The Black Russians...

Polyus... orbiting weapons platform launched by Buran's lifter Energia...

While it revolved around the Buran program I just use it as a lead in to the 'secret shuttles'



Yup its BLACK A special carbon fiber material with a black matte painting for camouflage, the skin was proported to have stealth radar deflecting properties

No member of the Reagan or Bush administrations ever admitted or revealed publicly any knowledge of Polyus. The US Navy made no statements about any attempts to investigate the wreckage of Polyus, which lies on the floor of the South Pacific.

THIS was the ship that stared Reagan's Star Wars program

www.thelivingmoon.com...

But there is another Black Russian... LKS



MOVIE Quicktime
Caption:
Firing a powerful laser, the LKS mini-Shuttle "zaps" a nuclear warhead in this interpretive animation, as it was envisioned in the 1980s by Vladimir Chelomei.

At the end of the 1980s, the Russian press revealed that a leading Soviet space designer, Vladimir Chelomei, had worked on a mini-Shuttle, which could be an economical alternative to the heavy US Space Shuttle and Russia's own Buran. However later publications hinted that Chelomei saw his reusable orbiter as the Soviet response to Ronald Reagan's "Star Wars" program. Chelomei's mini-Shuttle, apparently, would be capable of carrying laser weapons and shooting down American ballistic missiles.

www.russianspaceweb.com...

WHY are they shooting the "CRITTERS"????

America had a similar one The Black Horse. Still tough to get good details on that, but then I haven't looked last year or so and info has a way of surfacing

After his initial unsuccessful attempts to develop a reusable vehicle in the early 1960s, Chelomei returned to the concept of a winged orbiter at the beginning of the 1970s. Around 1975, Chelomei proposed a "smaller and cheaper" Soviet response to the US Space Shuttle.

www.thelivingmoon.com...

reply to post by SLAYER69

reply to post by zorgon

Hi Slayer.

And Zorgon too I guess

It's funny you bring this up, as this morning I was reading about the Russian Space Program during the cold war from a pretty interesting source. Check it out if you have the time.

Main Page: The Original Wizards of Langley / Overview of the Office of Scientific Intelligence

Document List

THE SOVIET SPACE RESEARCH PROGRAM MONOGRAPH IV - SPACE VEHICLES

Briefing Note on Advance Portion of NIE 11-5-59 - Soviet Capabilities in Guided Missiles and Space Vehicles

THE SOVIET BIOASTRONAUTICS RESEARCH PROGRAM

NIE NUMBER 11-6-59: SOVIET SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

THE SOVIET SPACE RESEARCH PROGRAM MONOGRAPH XI - ASTRONOMICAL ASPECTS

THE SOVIET SPACE RESEARCH PROGRAM MONOGRAPH VI - GUIDANCE AND CONTROL

And much, much more. All from a pretty reliable source I'd say. A good history lesson, which concerns the US and Russian and where we stood at certain times. Did not reallly have time to read all of them, so if anything "groundbreaking" slipped though, I would not know.

Hi Slayer and Zorgon,

Good to see you both in this thread

Slayer, it was great to see the side by side comparison. It's impossible to not wonder who got what from whom. I for one would like to see another round of space wars between Russia and the US. When we stop dreaming and exploring, we cease to be who we are. It is the fuel that drives us.

Not funding our programs is one of the dumbest moves we have made. The Space Programs should have been kept going full bore all along. The benefits would be enormous. The private sector simply does not have the resources to advance us without a profit motive. Not their fault, no money no fun Only a government could manage the resources and costs to keep us progressing.

Most controversial statement I can relate to this.

Zorgon, I'm expecting something like well, where do you think the Pentagon's 3 Trillion went from you? Am I wrong?

Thanks Slayer. An interesting thread once again.

Some stuff on Buran here...

englishrussia.com...

englishrussia.com...

englishrussia.com...

and here....

englishrussia.com...

Originally posted by Signals
Always a fascinating subject, the Buran.
A few years ago, a found some exterior tiles from it on sale on ebay...whether or not they were real who knows (?)

Yes they are real... I can get some still from a Russian contact... last I knew they were going for $160.00 US. But they are not off the Buran... they are from the OK 2.01 "Baikal" Most people call them all Buran but there were many models

The OK 2.01 "Baikal" is being 'parted out'

Here is another one being restored. Sign is Baikonur Cosmodrome Russian: Космодром Байконур

OK ML 1

reply to post by zorgon


Dang! How many of those Russian space shuttles are there? They are multiplying like gremlins....Kremlin Gremlins

Nice collection of photos Z!

reply to post by zorgon


What the hell Zorgy?

Now you're showing us Russian shuttle trash

reply to post by zorgon


I've seen Railroad Cars, Boats and Aircraft converted to live in; that old Shuttle would make a great summer home.

Those tiles would be great to use as a base to Solder on. I'd like to have one or two of those. Give me a shout if you can still get one?

Originally posted by Aggie Man
Dang! How many of those Russian space shuttles are there?

Well my list so far

List of “Burans”:

OK-TVA Found
Moscow Gorky Park on Google Earth

OK-GLI Found
Sydney Australia 2002
In Parts on Google Earth in Bahrain
now in Speyer Museum, Germany

OK-ML-1
Baikonur Khajakistan Google Earth on deck

OK-ML-2 Found
Formerly OK-MT was renamed to OK-ML-2
Hanger in Baikonur with Ptitcka
Building 80, Area 112A

BOR-5
OK-005 ? Found - For Sale
Bor5 Russian Test Shuttle
Serial #880451505

OK-KS 3M/OK-KS is at RSC Energiya
OK-TVI No Information Yet
OK-005 No Information Yet
OK-008 No Information Yet

4M is at Baikonur
5M is at TsAGI
6M is at NIIhimmash in Moscow region
7M is stored in the building at Baikonur
8M is at Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center

Flight Vehicles.

1.01 Found Buran
Destroyed in hangar collapse - On Google Earth
1.02 Found - Ptichka
Still intact inside another hangar
Building 80, Area 112A
2.01 Found - Never completed
Near Ivan'kovo, Moskovskaya Oblast', Moscow
- On Google Earth as of July 2008
2.02 Tushino factory. Its completion level was estimated to 10-20%. Because of the stop of the financing it remained on the ground of the factory for many years. Recently it was dismantled then put outside the hangar. A large number of its tiles were removed and are available on Internet.
2.03 Model 2.03 was the fifth and last shuttle in construction when the project was stopped in 1993.
It was completely dismantled, nothing remains of it today.

Das Vedanya, Buran! A marvelous machine!

I think it is more likely the Buran was canceled because by the time it was ready for use, it was already obsolete.

Why do we need manned flights for large payloads?

Where is the efficiency in designing a return vehicle for large payloads?

I think they have had a replacement craft for the SR71 before the SR71 was ever retired.

Personally, I think we have had much smaller manned vehicles capable of popping in and out of space since at least the 80ties. Drop the much smaller vehicle out of a C5 or other special designed craft at a high altitude. Have a launch craft with with powerful jet engines to boost the vehicle up to mach 5 or greater, release the small manned craft and use booster rockets to carry it up into orbit.

This technology has been available for quite some time. The money would have been there from the star wars program. The U.S. kept the SR-71 secret for so long, why not its predecessor?

Of course there are all of these triangle vehicles spotted all over the place. Are these vehicles space flight capable?

The X-37B unmanned space shuttle seems to be designed more to bring things back from space, than for any other reason. I believe I read that it does have manned capability, but that isn't something they plan on using the vehicle for.

Doesn't it seem preposterous that the U.S. will no longer have manned space flight capability?

I don't buy that at all.

Originally posted by poet1b

I think it is more likely the Buran was canceled because by the time it was ready for use, it was already obsolete.

yeah the Russians are more practical and more shy with their money. The Pen/Pencil story is an urban myth, but the principal behind it is not. The Russians don't waste money on pretty window dressing... if it works why buy a new one?

But a point... The Shuttle takes DAYS to complete its 'checklist landings and dockings. So long in fact that it is easy to speculate where the heck it goes in that time (funny that the x-37B also seems to get lost for weeks at a time... nothing suspicious her... move along... nothing to see)

But look at the ESA Mission 9 return time that I just happen to have... a simple old work horse Soyuz TMA...

Mission: Expedition 9/Soyuz 8
Vehicle: Soyuz TMA-4
Launch Pad: Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan

Undocking: Oct. 23, 2004, 4:08 p.m. CDT
Landing: Oct. 23, 2004, 7:36 p.m. CDT

spaceflight.nasa.gov...

Someone was in a rush to get home to the wife

Originally posted by poet1b
Of course there are all of these triangle vehicles spotted all over the place. Are these vehicles space flight capable?

No they are only "space debris"

The X-37B unmanned space shuttle seems to be designed more to bring things back from space, than for any other reason. I believe I read that it does have manned capability, but that isn't something they plan on using the vehicle for.

The BIG question is... WHAT and from WHERE

Wow this is EPIC.

You guys just taught me TONS of information. And I haven't even began to dig through these sources holy cow.

Slayer Massive thumbs up for starting this thread and Zorgon too you have put a lot into this as well.

THANK YOU to both of you guys for teaching me so much about this subject.
I love both of you guys!!


OK gonna go read more!!

reply to post by 12voltz


It doesn't have rocket engines, those are atmospheric breathing Ramjet engines on the Russian copy, not a real space shuttle.

reply to post by zorgon


And yet the U.S. seems completely uninterested in developing its own manned space flight launch vehicle!

Did NASA suddenly decide they don't need to continue to expand their expertise in manned launch vehicles?

Considering the advances in computer technology since the seventies, doesn't seem that hard to believe they could land a manned space flight capable vehicle on any number of landing strips.

It seems the only real purpose of a space flight vehicle to have landing capabilities is to bring back astronauts from space, and occasionally some cargo.

What are the odds that we have our own secret space station under Navy command?