The Buran spacecraft was the Soviet Union's response to NASA's space shuttle program. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works.

Footage of Buran’s 1988 launch ... On April 12, 1981, NASA’s STS-1 mission launched marking the beginning of the space shuttle program. And still, in spite of attempts to find it, there ...

The Soviets made one too, and it was known as the Buran. The Buran did fly in space – just once, in November 1988, not long before the Soviet Union collapsed. Its lone mission was uncrewed.

But all this attention on the old Buran does give us a good opportunity to really look at what the Soviets made there, and wonder, uselessly and in hindsight, if maybe, just maybe, their space ...

The Soviet Union's Buran space shuttle program stands as one of the saddest episodes in aerospace history. After NASA began working on its space shuttle program in the early 1970s, the Soviet ...

Tensions are continuing to escalate between a Kazakh businessman and Russian space officials over the fate of the second Buran-class orbiter, named Burya. The businessman, Dauren Musa, claims ...

The Buran project would have employed 30,000 people, and there were plans for up to 30 launches a year. The new Russian government finally cut off funding in 1992.