buran (spacecraft)
A partially reusable spacecraft built by the Soviet Union, in response to the American Space Shuttle.
Like the Space Shuttle, the Buran used a spaceplane orbiter launched vertically from a rocket, and landed like a conventional airplane. Unlike the Space Shuttle however, the rocket used to launch the orbiter could operate independently, and the orbiter was capable of fully automated landings.
A single working Buran spacecraft was built and flew one uncrewed mission back in 1988 before the project was canned due to the USSR collapse. The spacecraft itself was destroyed back in 2002 when the hangar it was housed in suffered a roof collapse.
