Rare photos of survived Burans.

[1greywind]

I must share this. Fresh photo report from Mounting and Refueling Facility (Ãœþýтðöýþ-÷ðÿрðòþчýыù úþüÿûõúÑÂ) on Baykonur's pad 112a - the home of full-size Buran's mockup and second fightworthy ship "Burya".

http://ralphmirebs.livejournal.com/219949.html

[rtxoff]

It's sad in what bad shape they are.

[1greywind]

It's sad in what bad shape they are.

My parents worked in Óßâß Óрðýøт - organization, responsible for construction of Buran's automatic landing facilities. And for me it is much more depressing and personal than just "sad"

[xenomorph555]

I agree this is beyond sad, I wish there could have been at least one manned mission.

Also it was cool to see the insides in those photos, I always wondered what it looked like inside.

[H2O.]

It is always sad to see such equipment not been taken care of with the respect they deserve.

On the other hand, those pictures are stunning, the sight of those two spacecraft in the same hangar is quite something!

[Scotius]

Oh my... At least NASA Shuttles either "died" doing their duty, or are properly cared for in museums. This is just sad.

[lajoswinkler]

Very, very sad. At least the authorities could clean them up and put them in a museum. This is very bad.

[Voidryder]

Ah, a real tragedy. How hard it must have been for everyone who sweated to bring those birds to life, only to have to leave them earthbound.

[Pixel of Life]

I'm assuming these are government owned... But surely they'd be willing to sell them (and maybe the blueprints as well?) to someone for a good price since they have no use for them anyway? For them, it's probably just useless rusty junk sitting in a hangar somewhere. Could a crowdfunding campaign raise enough money for buying and restoring both, or at least one of the shuttles and then placing it in a museum?

[_Augustus_]

I thought there was only one near-finished shuttle, Ptichka/Burya.

This shows two of them..

I feel sad for them.

[Hcube]

I'm assuming these are government owned... But surely they'd be willing to sell them (and maybe the blueprints as well?) to someone for a good price since they have no use for them anyway? For them, it's probably just useless rusty junk sitting in a hangar somewhere. Could a crowdfunding campaign raise enough money for buying and restoring both, or at least one of the shuttles and then placing it in a museum?

it would probably be very freaking expensive, but it's worth trying. Who knows, maybe some buying and restoration projects already exist

Check this website for more info about Buran and its state of conservation. There are some very beautiful pictures of Energia and Buran in the gallery

Edited June 6, 2015 by Hcube

[Kryten]

I thought there was only one near-finished shuttle, Ptichka/Burya.

This shows two of them..

I feel sad for them.

That's 1.02 and a structural test article. 2.01 is also externally complete and acts as a perennial airshow exhibit.

[1greywind]

I thought there was only one near-finished shuttle, Ptichka/Burya.

This shows two of them..

I feel sad for them.

The "ßтøчúð" (Ptichka) was flying mock-up with airbreathing engines for landing tests - http://buran.ru/htm/anabst.htm. The "Burya" is the second Buran class shuttle. Second "Buran" in Ãœ×ÃÅ¡ is full-size mockup for mating and load tests. Burya has RCS thrusters installed to ports on nose, mockup has blind RCS port:

Burya:

Mockup:

[Louella]

what's all the muck on them? Bird droppings? Are those buildings open to the environment?

[ScriptKitt3h]

Someone really ought to convince whoever owns the partially complete one- (Burya?) to let it either get restored or used to make a proper commercially-owned large shuttle.

Think of the possibilities that open up if a private spaceflight company flew shuttles like Buran...

[StrandedonEarth]

Very sad to see the facility and its contents abandoned like that. The original Buran was destroyed in a hangar roof collapse. Buran Wiki

[Scotius]

what's all the muck on them? Bird droppings? Are those buildings open to the environment?

Probably birds started nesting inside after windows started to break because of age and weather. I bet those hangars are full of pigeon nests.

[_Augustus_]

Someone really ought to convince whoever owns the partially complete one- (Burya?) to let it either get restored or used to make a proper commercially-owned large shuttle.

Think of the possibilities that open up if a private spaceflight company flew shuttles like Buran...

What if someone started a kickstarter to buy Burya for a museum or get RKK Energia to move it to their museum? Burya is probably worth $50 million or less due to the lack of electronics, being incomplete, and the overall decay.

[grawl]

well, when i see what a car left under a tree for a few weeks in Paris is becoming (full bird dropping paint), I can imagine that over the course of the years even a few birds could cover the whole thing.

An intersting thing, on the burya frontal picture, we can see there is probably a beam just over there where the birds stay, and do their bird thing ^^, as there is a clean linear spot on the nose.

[SelectHalfling0]

I'm surprised a company hasn't bought them to refurbish them or at least study them.

[Kryten]

Why would anyone? Without something like Energiya to carry them, they're useless. They don't carry parts of the propulsion system like STS did, they're just payloads.

[Hcube]

Yeah, as sad as it is, Buran is now outdated and serves no purpose... Besides, the legal owner of the M3k hangar and its contents is now Khazakstan, and since they are pretty broke i can't see how they would use them in any way...

[Camacha]

Yeah, as sad as it is, Buran is now outdated and serves no purpose... Besides, the legal owner of the M3k hangar and its contents is now Khazakstan, and since they are pretty broke i can't see how they would use them in any way...

Being broke makes it interesting for someone to cheaply buy them and use them for a museum, or Jeb forbid, a theme park.

[Nibb31]

There are a couple of others.

OK-GLI is actually at the Technikmusem Speyer in Germany.

OK-TVA (Static test mockup) is at Gorky Park (55°43'43.63"N 37°35'48.41"E), Moscow

OK-ML1 (static test mockup) used to be outside (45°55'10.13"N 63°18'35.99"E), but it looks like it has been moved inside the MZK building with OK-1K2 (45°56'25.98"N 63°19'5.18"E)

OK-1K1 (Buran) was destroyed in the hangar collapse (45°55'40.92"N 63°17'51.83"E)

OK-1K2 (Pitchka) is in the MZK building in Baikonur (45°56'25.98"N 63°19'5.18"E).

OK-2K1 (Baikal) is now at Ramenskoye–Zhukovsky Airport (55°33′06″N 38°08′40″E)

OK-2K2 is a half-built fuselage at the Tushino Machine Building Plant (55°50'28.83"N 37°27'57.90"E) near Moscow (not much to see)

OK-2K3 was only just started and dismantled.

In fact, it's amazing how many Buran airframes were built when only one of them flew to orbit. They might have been able to save the program if they had stuck to 1 or 2 orbiters instead of going straight for a fleet of 5 or 6.

Edited June 7, 2015 by Nibb31

[Tex_NL]

Being broke makes it interesting for someone to cheaply buy them and use them for a museum, or Jeb forbid, a theme park.

True. But converting one into a theme park ride is still better than wasting away is some forgotten hangar. Even though the Buran concept was stolen from the USA during the cold war it does deserve its place in history.