Six years earlier in 1976, the USSR began development of the Buran reusable orbiter and Energia super rocket, Soviet equivalents to the U.S.’s Space Shuttle and solid rocket booster, respectively.

The Antonov AN-225 Mriya wasn’t just an aircraft,it was a symbol of unmatched engineering ambition. Built in the 1980s by the Soviet Union to transport the massive Buran space shuttle and parts of the ...

The Soviet response was a hushed effort that came with the potential to roar. ... The Energia organisation, the body behind the Soyuz spacecraft, began studying both Skif and Kaskad in 1976.

Explore the remarkable story of Buran, the Soviet Union’s secret space shuttle that stunned the world with its fully automated launch and landing capabilities, outclassing NASA’s iconic Space ...

Soviet Union’s Buran Space Shuttle Is on the Dustheap of History. ... Energia’s first flight, on March 15, 1987 was to carry the Polyus-Skif experimental laser weapon into space.

Design work began in the 1970s, not long after the symbolic Apollo-Soyuz "handshake in space" between NASA astronauts and Soviet cosmonauts. The famed Energia organization, which had built the ...

The Soviet Energia-Buran system did have some real technical advantages over the NASA Space Shuttle program. But, NASA did manage to do a hell of a lot more with their program, ...

A SOVIET space rocket has been left to rot near a desert in an abandoned ship graveyard. The rusting 2,650-ton Energia M rocket was once envisioned as the USSR’s lethal weapon that could take… ...

The Soviet Union attempted to build its own reusable space shuttle system with Buran (the shuttle) and Energia (the launch vehicle) during the 1980s. Buran only carried out one flight, while ...

The Soviet leadership, perhaps buoyed by American confidence in the project, authorized the Buran (“Snowstorm”) program in February 1976. ... Energia, that would carry it into space.

Fifty years ago today, on September 18, 1968, the Soviet Union’s Zond 5 spacecraft circled the moon, ferrying the first living creatures known to have orbited another world. On board were two Russian ...