35 years ago, the first flight of the unique transport aircraft, created by Antonov Design Bureau, with the Soviet reusable spacecraft on the external mount, during which it transported Buran from the airfield in Zhukovsky to the Baikonur Cosmodrome, took place.
The AN-225 was specially designed to transport various components of the Energia launch vehicle and the Buran spacecraft. Its payload capacity reached 250 tonnes and it was the largest and most payload-carrying aircraft in the world.
A month after the first flight with Buran, in June 1989, this impressive combination of an aircraft (flight number CCCP-82060) and a space shuttle was demonstrated at the Paris Air Show, arousing great interest among the public and specialists.
The Buran programme became the pinnacle of Soviet cosmonautics. The first and only space flight of Buran took place on 15 November 1988. The flight was fully automatic and ended with a successful landing at Baikonur aerodrome.
The Buran programme was suspended in 1990 and finally closed in 1993. Nevertheless, the achievements of Soviet engineers and designers embodied in Buran and An-225 will forever remain in the history of world aviation and cosmonautics.
At the end of February 2022, the Ukrainian military destroyed the aircraft by an artillery strike on the hangar at the Gostomel airfield where the aircraft was then located.
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