The Burya programme was cancelled by the USSR in favor of a decision to develop ICBMs instead. The Burya had the goal of delivering a nuclear payload, presumably to the United States, and then returning to base. Several test flights were made before it was cancelled by order of the Central Committee. The first step toward a reusable Soviet spacecraft was the 1954 Burya, a high-altitude prototype jet aircraft/cruise missile. Before Buran, no project of the programme reached operational status. The idea of Soviet reusable space flight is very old, though it was neither continuous nor consistently organized. The Soviet reusable spacecraft programme has its roots in the late 1950s, at the very beginning of the space age. The project was the largest and the most expensive in the history of Soviet space exploration. Unlike the Space Shuttle, Buran had a capability of flying uncrewed missions, as well as performing fully automated landings. Smaller rocket engines on the craft's body provided propulsion in orbit and de-orbital burns, similar to the Space Shuttle's OMS pods. For example, the main engines during launch were on the Energia rocket and were not taken into orbit by the spacecraft. Although the Buran class was similar in appearance to NASA's Space Shuttle orbiter, and could similarly operate as a re-entry spaceplane, its final internal and functional design was different. The Buran programme was started by the Soviet Union as a response to the United States Space Shuttle program and benefited from extensive espionage undertaken by the KGB of the unclassified US Space Shuttle program, resulting in many superficial and functional similarities between American and Soviet Shuttle designs. The Buran-class orbiters used the expendable Energia rocket as a launch vehicle. In addition to being the designation for the whole Soviet/Russian reusable spacecraft project, Buran was also the name given to Orbiter 1K, which completed one uncrewed spaceflight in 1988 and was the only Soviet reusable spacecraft to be launched into space. Space Shuttle program, coincidentally took place exactly 20 years after Yuri Gagarin became the first human to travel to space, on April 12, 1961.Īs of 2011, the day of April 12 was declared by the United Nations as International Day of Human Space Flight, "to celebrate each year at the international level the beginning of the space era for mankind, reaffirming the important contribution of space science and technology in achieving sustainable development goals and increasing the well-being of States and peoples, as well as ensuring the realization of their aspiration to maintain outer space for peaceful purposes.The Buran programme ( Russian: Буран, IPA:, "Snowstorm", "Blizzard"), also known as the " VKK Space Orbiter programme" ( Russian: ВКК «Воздушно-Космический Корабль», lit.'Air and Space Ship'), was a Soviet and later Russian reusable spacecraft project that began in 1974 at the Central Aerohydrodynamic Institute in Moscow and was formally suspended in 1993. A technical problem delayed takeoff until the 12th.Īs a result, the first launch of Columbia and thus the first launch of the U.S. Originally, Columbia was scheduled to launch two days earlier, on April 10. Courtesy of NASAĬlick here to subscribe to This Day in Weather HistoryĬolumbia was the first aircraft-like shuttle that launched like a rocket and landed like a plane.Īfter two days, six hours, 20 minutes, and 53 seconds orbiting the planet, Columbia landed, having travelled 1,728,000 km. The STS-1 crew members, Commander John W. It was America's first crewed mission since the Apollo–Soyuz Test Project in 1975. 12 launch at Pad 39A of STS-1, just seconds past 7 a.m., carried astronauts John Young and Robert Crippen into an Earth orbital mission scheduled to last for 54 hours, ending with unpowered landing at Edwards Air Force Base in California." Courtesy of NASA/WikipediaĪboard the flight was the mission's commander, John W. Prior to this, the Space Shuttle Enterprise had performed atmospheric tests, but Columbia was the first to reach space and travel around the Earth. It was the first launch of the Space Shuttle Columbia, and NASA's first orbital flight of the Space Shuttle program. 12, 1981, NASA's Space Transportation System-1 (or STS-1) mission launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida. This Day In Weather History is a daily podcast by Chris Mei from The Weather Network, featuring stories about people, communities and events and how weather impacted them.
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