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The Story of Baikonur, Russia's Space City
Posted by
Zonk
on Sun Oct 21, 2007 08:00 PM
from the you're-the-rocket-man dept.
from the you're-the-rocket-man dept.
eldavojohn writes "There's an article up on Physorg about Russian space launch city Baikonur, rented by Russia from Kazakhstan. Although it is essentially the same as it was in the 60's and 70's, it is amazingly efficient and still operational. 'Even the technology hasn't changed much. The Soyuz spacecraft designed in the mid-1960s is still in service, somewhat modified. It can only be used once, but costs just $25 million. The newest Endeavor space shuttle cost $2 billion, but is reusable. Life and work in Baikonur and its cosmodrome are also pretty much what they were in the Soviet era. The town of 70,000 - unbearably hot in summer, freezing cold in winter and dusty year round - is isolated by hundreds of miles of scrubland.'" We last discussed Baikonur back in 2005.
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[+]
Kazakhstan's Spaceship Junkyard 307 comments
Richard W.M. Jones writes "What happens to the booster stages of rockets?
They fall back to earth, and in most cases
into the oceans. But not in Baikonur, Kazakhstan,
where the first stages fall over populated
farmland. The locals have become rich
dealing in the titanium-rich scrap metal
as this
article and this
remarkable photo essay show.
So far the only casualties seem to have
been a few
dead cows."
[+]
Russia's New Cosmodome Approved 83 comments
eldavojohn writes "You may recall discussing Baikonur, the Kazakhstan city rented by Russia that has been used as a launch site for quite some time. Today, Putin has just approved construction of Vostochny between 2010 and 2018 which will be positioned in the far east of Russia to complement the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in the northern part of the country. This is not bad news for Kazakhstan as the director of the Russian Federal Space Agency has announced they plan to operate this facility alongside Baikonur."
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Costs (Score:5, Informative)
It also lists the launch costs for a shuttle at about $450 million. I don't know if that's just the launch itself or if that includes the turn around costs. Of course - the article doesn't list similar numbers for the Soyuz - but it seems that while reusable - the shuttle still is exponentially more expensive. Although - I don't know of anything else that can get as much weight to orbit as the shuttle.
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Re:Costs (Score:5, Informative)
The launcher can lift 7,800 kg to LEO.
Parent
Re:Costs (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, that is why something like 80% of ISS supplies did not arrive there by the Progress launch, no?
And the major Russian modules had to be lifted by the Shuttle, certainly?
Or perheaps the Russians use separate payload carriers which can range up to the Energia class of rockets which make the Space Shuttle look like a wimp at 4 times its payload to LEO and equal to the Shuttle's payload to .. Mars.
So one should really compare 2 Soyuz capsules (6 people) + payload launch = 1 Space Shuttle launch. Still its something like $25 mil x 2 for the Soyuzes + $60 mil for the Energia (at the expensive, all frills added end - the technology is not radically different from the Soyuz boosters) = $110 mil per launch. Which is 1/4th of a relaunch of a Shuttle, never you mind the up-front $1.7 billion cost. And the Shuttle, unlike the Energia payload, is rather unlikely to make it to Mars or Venus.
Not to mention that the thing is a death trap which killed 14 astronauts in the last two decades and is unlikely to stop there.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
True, I had Energia mixed up in my mind with the Protons and the like. This does not matter however since what I was talking about is the practical concept and the costs of disposable boosters versus the cost-plus s
Re:Costs (Score:5, Informative)
At 21,000 kg to LEO, the Ariane 5 ECA [wikipedia.org] comes pretty close. And it does a lot better than the shuttle [wikipedia.org] to Geostationary Transfer Orbit. The Delta IV [wikipedia.org] does slightly better than the shuttle at 25,800kg to LEO versus the shuttle's 24,400kg.
The Saturn V [wikipedia.org] could put them all to shame. Although the planned Ares V [wikipedia.org] can carry even more than the Saturn V.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
You're right that Saturn V is still king though, and will remain so for the immediate future. 118,000 kg, that's incredible, really.
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Saturn V lifted 118,000kg to LEO, Ares V will be 130,000kg to LEO. The shuttle is a mere 24,400kg to LEO (discounting the mass of the shuttle orbiter, itself).
All would've been outperformed by a maximum-configuration Energia-Vulkan @ 175,000kg to LEO. Frankly, nobody's ever come up with anything like a big enough rocket to really put human spaceflight into gear (i.e. Putting supplies & 20-50 people up, at
Re:Costs (Score:4, Interesting)
Going on the numbers given here, the Shuttle costs $18,400/kg lifted to LEO, while the Soyuz costs $28,400 for the same lift.
Parent
Well, (Score:3, Interesting)
Don't believe the $25 million (Score:5, Funny)
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maybe you should consider the safety records of Soyuz vs the shuttle, before making such statements...
Their safety records are similar. The shuttle has flown 119 times, the initial 4 missions with a crew of 2 all following missions 5-8, only 2 have had 8. The shuttle has had 2 disasters with all hands lost. The soyuz has flown 98 times, has a maximum crew of three and has had 2 disasters with all hands lost. Some people like to point out the last fatal incident for a manned soyuz spacecraft was 1971, but an unmanned soyuz-u launch vehicle did explode as recently as 2002 killing one and injuring seven.
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Also you would probably save your government a hell of a lot of money if you let the russians produce the hardware.
If there is anything they do it's reliable stuff. (True for tanks, guns and whatever aswell.)
Not a problem for me! (Score:3, Interesting)
I second both IWannaBeAnAC and aliquis on this one, they are giving it to you straight up.
Also, I would consider insurance no matter what the source of my hardware for a 'Space Operation'....there are so many things that can fail and cause catastrophic failure.
As an American I hate to admit it (yes, I'm old enough to remember McCarthy, and having every public access gov't. building having to have a bomb shelter), but as far as heavy lift solutions, they are at the top of the heap. Effecien
Soviet Russia (Score:4, Insightful)
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In Soviet Russia, the memes mod YOU!
Go Meme Yourself (Score:3, Interesting)
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"I went into my local library bathroom and out comes this big blond guy from a stall..."
Re:Soviet Russia (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Soviet Russia (Score:4, Interesting)
Actually, I suspect that many regulars do like the endless repetition of "in Soviet Russia" and "our x overlords". You and I get tired of hearing the same jokes over and over, but we might well be in the minority.
One problem is that the mod system give you a way to mod up good jokes, but no way to mod down bad ones. ("Overrated" is not supposed to be used for that, though it sometimes is.) So anybody who has a reaction to a story that's even vaguely humorous jumps in with it, because theres a good chance they'll be modded up.
Solution: balance the upmode "funny" with a new downmod: "lame".
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Re:Soviet Russia (Score:4, Funny)
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Bargain space flight (Score:4, Interesting)
If the shuttle costs $2 billion, and a Soyuz is only $25 million, we could send up 80 Soyuz launches for that same $2 billion.
And if we expand it to cover that there have been 5 shuttles built, that becomes 400 Soyuz flights.
To put that in to perspective, there has only been 119 shuttle launches thus far, and 2 of those $2 billion dollar shuttles came back in little pieces parts. Plus, it doesn't even figure in launch expenses, just the price of the shuttles themselves. Hard to believe that way back when the shuttles were designed, they were expected to each be launched 100 times.
At those rates, it doesn't matter that a Soyuz isn't reusable.
Re:Bargain space flight (Score:5, Insightful)
PM: Soyuz costs $50 million a mission--the space shuttle costs more than $2.5 billion to get back up, and under the best conditions it costs $500 million
GO: That's tough. Remember, we could not have built the ISS without the shuttle. The shuttle has a huge cargo-carrying capacity. The Soyuz cannot do that, as reliable as it is. The shuttle has had its drawbacks, but it is the workhorse, and it was necessary in order to do the ISS.
They give more about cost - and he gives one view about the shuttle's capacity that adds a different perspective.
Parent
Re:Bargain space flight (Score:5, Insightful)
The Saturn V had the ability to lift 118,000 kg to low earth orbit, to the Space Shuttle's 24,400 kg - and that at a similar cost per launch.
The Delta IV can lift up to about the Space Shuttle's capacity at $250 million a launch. The Russian Proton-M can lift a little less than the Shuttle at $100 million a launch. There are plenty of alternatives to the Shuttle for launching large payloads.
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Re:Bargain space flight (Score:5, Interesting)
In any event it seems like the saturn v's could have gotten the IIS up in aprox 4 lifts, this would seem more efficient as there would be less hardware joining sections together.
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Re:Bargain space flight (Score:5, Informative)
They did bring 2 or 3 Sats down from orbit in the early days
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That all went away with Challenger. I can remember watching the couple of sat recovers on TV (Yeah - I'm an older geek - heck, I was writing some code at WORK when I heard Challenger was destroyed). I can
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To be quite serious there are a lot of people and infrastructure missing to recreate a Saturn V so it would be better to do something else that it's designers understand in every detail from early in it's development. The Russians have a large rocket in development - there's an ISS so why not international effort on a launch vehicle?
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That's tough. Remember, we could not have built the ISS without the shuttle. The shuttle has a huge cargo-carrying capacity. The Soyuz cannot do that, as reliable as it is. The shuttle has had its drawbacks, but it is the workhorse, and it was necessary in order to do the ISS.
According to data from Wikipedia: SS payload to LEO: 24400kg Orbiter mass: 68,586.6kg So, to get 24 tons of cargo into orbit, we send nearly 70 tons extra. As a comparison, Russian Proton rocket launches 22 tons into orbit, and uses 40 years old proven design, and was used for launching the parts of the Mir station. So, why exactly do we need Space Shuttle? Do I hear someone mentioning Saturn 5?
Re:Bargain space flight (Score:5, Insightful)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Space_Shuttle_vs_Soyuz_TM_-_to_scale_drawing.png [wikipedia.org]
The Shuttle is probably a stupid way to put people in orbit, but that isn't all it is used for.
Parent
Re:Bargain space flight (Score:4, Insightful)
Why would you want to?
Launch cargo(like satellites) on cargo rockets. Life people in capsules designed for people.
As others have pointed out, there are a number of rockets capable of lifting a similar payload as the shuttle - for half the launch cost of the shuttle.
I've seen figures of $500 million for a shuttle launch, $50M for a soyuz(including the capsule), $250 for the Delta IV.
That means we can duplicate the shuttle for about three launches - 2 soyuz(a shuttle can hold more people) $100M total, and a Delta IV for $250M. This totals $350M, leaving me 150M off the launch costs alone to use for other purposes. Like building a space station that's actually useful.
For rather less than the cost of a shuttle, you should be able to design a 'soyuz/apollo heavy' capable of lifting the same number of people as the shuttle.
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At that point (1970?) some complacency was setting in, around the generally successful Moon flights. The military also added fuel to the fire by asking for some configurations that are almost impossible. This resulted in a very complex machine, and one flight can bankrupt a medium-sized nation. Nobody knew how much has to be rebuilt after each flight until they got a vehicle back and looked at i
Re:Bargain space flight (Score:4, Interesting)
First of all, does the Soyuz figure of 25 mil include the cost of the launch vehicle or just the spacecraft? A search for per launch cost of Soyuz gives me figures from 40-60 mil.
Secondly, Shuttle has a maximum payload of 50,000lb, Soyuz is more in the region of 15,000lb. That gives about $200 mil for 4 Soyuz launches versus $450 mil per one Shuttle launch for equivalent amount of cargo. Of course there is the initial cost of the shuttle as well to take into account but unlike Soyuz that is spread over multiple launches.
Still, he only thing that really matters is the cost per pound of payload and Soyuz still beats Shuttle by a long way.
Parent
Reusable shuttle? Not really .. (Score:5, Insightful)
"The Soyuz spacecraft designed in the mid-1960s is still in service, somewhat modified. It can only be used once, but costs just $25 million. The newest Endeavor space shuttle cost $2 billion, but is reusable"
Each shuttle mission costs a half-billion to launch. So many systems have to be rebuilt and retested that it would be cheaper to make them throw-away.
For example, by the time the shuttle engines are on the launch pad, they've been rebuilt pretty much from scratch and retested, which takes up almost 90% of their rated lifetime. Like a race car engine that has to be rebuilt every 750 miles, but is test for 675 miles before the race ...
Saying the shuttle is re-usable without looking at the real costs is ignoring reality.
Re:Reusable shuttle? Not really .. (Score:5, Informative)
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The Space Shuttle is GREAT (Score:5, Insightful)
We are all aware of the negatives of the shuttle, but let's look at some of the positives of this system. First and foremost, the interior of the space shuttle is -huge- compared to the interior of a Soyuz, or for that matter, any other manned space craft. The Soyuz can bring up 2 or 3 astronauts, while shuttle missions with 6 or 7 are not uncommon. The Soyuz, the Apollo and the nascent Orion are essentially ballistic nosecones with people stuffed in it. The space shuttle has a habital volume, for its crew compartment alone, of over 70 cubic meters. The soyuz, on the other hand, has a habital volume of just 7 cubic meters. Astronauts in these capsules basically sit in their chairs, but in the shuttle they can get up, move around, and do things. The space shuttle is practically a space station in its own right.
The space shuttle has a cargo bay, and, thanks to the Canadians, has a really cool mechanical arm. The cargo bay can be pressurized for even more space, or it can contain additional research facilities. Have we forgotten that the European Space Agency has flown a science station in the space shuttle cargo bay already? Have we forgotten about the repairs made to Hubble? The Space Shuttle can and has repaired other satellites, and right now, is the ONLY SYSTEM that can bring them back a largish cargo from space to earth.
Everyone seems to like knocking NASA, cheering on the likes of Burt Rutan and the X-Prize in hopes for some private sector miracle, but I've not seen any private sector initiative, from scratch, put so much as a suitcase into orbit, certainly not a man, and nothing like the space shuttle. Those fancy suborbital flights are a joke - 3000mph requires a fraction of the total kinetic energy to attain the orbital velocity of over 17000mph. Let me know when anyone, really, anyone builds something as cool as the shuttle...and the thing is, when we're back to tiny capsules for manned space flight, when the naysayers win and the shuttles are tossed off to museums, everyone is going to compare the capsule to the shuttle and say geez, by far, the shuttle was the cooler thing, and the capsule is a step backwards, not forward, and that our next space ship should have been a newer version of the shuttle, not a rehashed capsule.
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For example, how many missions prior to the Shuttle had problems with insulation falling onto other parts
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Of course the Soviets noticed this was a bad idea (it would be smarter to send the cargo on top of the Energia rocket and not carry Buran's dead weight) and aborted the project after the first flight.
They could have aborted it before, but then there was that national pride thin
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Have you ever actually looked at a picture of a Buran on the launch pad? Try this one. [wikipedia.org]
Oh? Check out this picture of Energia configured to carry cargo. [buran.ru]
Actually,
Re:The Space Shuttle is GREAT (Score:5, Insightful)
Since the intention behind it (and other projects as well) was to give technical parity between the two superpowers and the Buran gave nothing new (the USSR could launch people and cargo to space better without it), it got scrapped. They could not afford to let the US develop something significantly better, so they had to do something on the same lines, just to be safe. The main difference is they took less time to figure out it was a really bad idea. And keep in mind theirs was a better one.
The problem is not "build a reusable spacecraft" but rather "get this thing to orbit, for less money than we already pay". If you focus on the wrong problem, it's inevitable you arrive at the wrong solution.
As it happened, Buran was a great solution to get something down in one piece. Unfortunately, that doesn't happen often enough to justify the money spent on it.
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It's not revisionist to think they probably ran out of money _because_ the Buran solved no real problem that had not already been solved with other technologies. Had the Buran a real task to do, it would probably get some funding.
You do know that the soviet union was collapsing at the time, right? The lack of funding for Buran had nothing to do with the program and everything to do with the economic and political state of the union. Buran could have been the greatest space program ever conceived and it still would have been cancelled.
Re:The Space Shuttle is GREAT (Score:4, Interesting)
There must be a way to ferry big stuff into orbit frequently - even if it is just a truckload of provisions for the ISS or a whole vehicle capable of taking a crew to the Moon and back. There must be a way to send people to the ISS and back. There must be a way to allow those people already in space to repair expensive stuff like the Hubble. Finally, there should probably be a way to return things the size of the Hubble back to Earth in one piece.
Sending large things to orbit is very frequent, ferrying people is less frequent and bringing back stuff is even less frequent if needed at all.
Having something that does all three at the same time seems like a bad idea.
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Re:The Space Shuttle is GREAT (Score:5, Interesting)
Design a space station that only has to survive being lifted once, and doesn't have to come down intact. Heck, make it modular - remove pieces as they wear out and let them drop back if you want to.
For satellite repair design a space tug that can go out with some astronauts and the robotic arm to conduct repairs on satellites. It should be almost an order of magnitude lighter than the shuttle, so it shouldn't take much fuel. For longer repairs, consider hauling the satellite back to the station. Heck, have a bigalow structure you can haul larger cargo into and pressurize if you want.
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Re:The Space Shuttle is GREAT (Score:5, Interesting)
The reason the Shuttle is a bad idea and remains so, is that it isn't economical to use. Many of those capabilities are unnecessary and add little value to the Shuttle. That's why it's only being used for launching ISS components and a Hubble repair mission. If the ISS were complete, the Shuttle would already be dead, and we'd be saving ourselves $2 billion or more a year.
Everyone seems to like knocking NASA, cheering on the likes of Burt Rutan and the X-Prize in hopes for some private sector miracle, but I've not seen any private sector initiative, from scratch, put so much as a suitcase into orbit, certainly not a man, and nothing like the space shuttle. Those fancy suborbital flights are a joke - 3000mph requires a fraction of the total kinetic energy to attain the orbital velocity of over 17000mph. Let me know when anyone, really, anyone builds something as cool as the shuttle...and the thing is, when we're back to tiny capsules for manned space flight, when the naysayers win and the shuttles are tossed off to museums, everyone is going to compare the capsule to the shuttle and say geez, by far, the shuttle was the cooler thing, and the capsule is a step backwards, not forward, and that our next space ship should have been a newer version of the shuttle, not a rehashed capsule.
Orbital Sciences and the Pegasus did just that in the late 80's. NASA started feeding them contracts so they wouldn't compete with the big players. Second, those fancy suborbital flights are closer to orbit than you think. They have higher delta-v's due to gravitational and air resistance losses (I'd say it turns a factor of five into a factor of 2-4). Also you can stage lifters. My take is that a three stage rocket will get you there. And we all know there are two stage to orbit launchers out there. No reason a private company can't repeat with its own funds what a private company did with government funds.
Ultimately, economics is far more important than "coolness". The Shuttle never was economical. Too bad it took us around thirty years to figure that out.
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Re:The Space Shuttle is GREAT (Score:5, Insightful)
The Soyuz system is remarkable in that it's been reliable. They're not perfect. Yes, they had fatal accidents, however, the last one occured in 1971. They learned from those failures and implemented design changes in the later modules. Yes, it's also true that Soyuz has only flown around 100 manned flights; but, even when it fails, as the NAV system did today, the people return alive. That's a reputation that's hard to argue with.
I think what we've learned from operating the shuttle and looking at the Russian program, is that simple makes for a better MTBF and does it at a lower cost. It may not be gee-wiz. It may appear to be a step backward. If this means the people come home alive, it's the right move. Use the big boosters, in parallel, to put the equipment in space and then have the people meet it there.
It's like we tried to run, when we didn't know how to walk yet. We stumbled a few times, scrapped our knees. Now we're being a little more cautious as we learn to walk with confidence. We'll run again, when the times right, that is, when the technology catches up and the infrastructure is in place.
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Q. How much does it cost to launch a Space Shuttle (Score:3, Insightful)
In other words, the whole shuttle program had been a big waste of money that set the American space exploration back by several decades. The whole thing should have been canned after the Challenger disaster. At that point it was already so damn obvious that the program failed MOST of its original goals. This situation is so bad that Russians can indeed successfully compete with us even though they're using decades old technology and at a fraction of our costs.