Why the Soviet Space Shuttle Only Flew Once

Buran, the Soviet space shuttle, circled the Earth twice and landed itself in 1988, so why did it never fly again? It starts with Soviet fears about the American Shuttle and a 1976 order to match it. Then comes the uncrewed flight, when Buran changed its own landing plan in a gusting crosswind. A second flight was scheduled, and a hangar at Baikonur was waiting. You leave knowing what grounded a machine that worked, and what a collapsing roof took in 2002. PHOTOS - Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation (mil.ru) — CC BY 4.0 — https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Dmitry_Ustinov_colorized_full_cropped_(b)_(2).jpg - Alan Wilson — CC BY-SA 2.0 — https://www.flickr.com/photos/ajw1970/8605746284/ CHAPTERS 0:00 One Flight, Then a Crushed Orbiter 1:01 Washington's Shuttle Alarms Moscow 2:21 Building Buran and Energia 3:34 Polyus and the Pilots 5:40 The Launch and Automatic Landing 9:29 The Second Flight Never Comes 11:05 Money or Purpose? 12:45 The Hangar Roof Collapses 13:59 What Remains of the Programme SOURCES - Dwayne A. Day, Nuking Moscow with a Space Shuttle (The Space Review): https://thespacereview.com/article/3855/1 - Bart Hendrickx and Dwayne A. Day, Target Moscow (part 2): the decision to build Buran (The Space Review, 2020): https://thespacereview.com/article/3876/1 - Anatoly Zak, RussianSpaceWeb, Buran reusable shuttle: https://www.russianspaceweb.com/buran.html - Buran.fr, Buran's first flight, 15 Nov 1988: https://buran.fr/en/bourane-buran/bourane-versvol-1erVol.php - The New York Times, 30 Oct 1988, launch scrubbed (reproduced by Buran.fr): https://buran.fr/en/documentation/documentation-biblio-new-york-times-10-30-1988.php - Komsomolskaya Pravda, 16 Nov 1988, Buran Above the Planet (reproduced by Buran.fr): https://buran.fr/en/documentation/documentation-biblio-komsol-pravda-16-11-1988.php - Interview with test pilot Igor Volk (Buran-Energia.com): https://www.buran-energia.com/interviews/igor-volk-interview.php - Spaceflight Now, Eight feared dead in Baikonur hangar collapse (May 2002): https://spaceflightnow.com/news/n0205/13baikonur/ - Technik Museum Speyer, Space Shuttle Buran (OK-GLI): https://www.technik-museum.de/en/discover/exhibits/space-shuttle-buran/ - Wikipedia, Buran programme: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buran_programme ARCHIVE FOOTAGE AP Archive, Cape Canaveral Space Force Museum, Roscosmos TV. MUSIC Music licensed from Epidemic Sound. KEYWORDS buran, soviet space shuttle, buran space shuttle, why the soviet space shuttle only flew once, buran 1988 flight, energia rocket, buran hangar collapse, baikonur, ptichka, polyus, ok-gli, energia buran, soviet space program, cold war space race, space shuttle history, failed machines documentary, once upon an engine, failed machines, machines that failed, engineering disasters, engineering history, forgotten machines, airship history, aviation history, engineering documentary