Hello, Ric here with a brief video looking at a Star Trek starship, its origin, fate
and real life namesakes. This time I thought we could look into the history of the USS
Buran and vessels of its name from continuity across the shows and extra canonical sources.
The Buran name has been associated with space since 1974 with the VKK Space Orbiter Programme,
also known as the Buran Programme. The name means “blizzard” in Russian and aimed
to produce a space plane around the same time as the USA was running its own Space Shuttle
programme. While from the outside it looked very similar, not surprising considering they
were designed for the same purpose really, their interiors and tech was a little more
varied. The first orbiter plane was, naturally termed
a Buran-class and named the Bruan 11F35 1K. However, the Buran only ever completed one
spaceflight, and an unmanned one at that on the 15th November 1988. With the dissolving
of the Soviet Union in 1991, funding for the Buran Project ended and the whole thing came
to a close. It’s official end came in 1993 and on May 12th 2002, a collapse at Biakonur
Cosmodrome destroyed the space plane. In Star Trek, aside from there being a planet
called Buran, we have the first Federation vessel of the name, the USS Buran was a Columbia-class
Starship. The Columbia class itself is the not-strictly-canon overhaul to the NX class.
Originally, the NX vessels such as Enterprise were pulled in from 2156 onwards to be overhauled
and have a secondary hull added to house a new warp drive. Once the NX classes had been
upgraded, the fledgling Federation began to manufacture original Columbia class ships,
the first two of which were the Buran and Shenlong, which continued the space plane-naming
convention. The USS Buran was launched in 2165 but was lost in combat with an unknown
enemy at some time, presumed Romulans. This however is only mentioned in passing by a
future captain of a USS Buran. Speaking of, the USS Buran NCC-1422 was launched
in the early 23rd century and a Cardenas-Class starship. The vessel was captained by Gabriel
Lorca and took part during the Klingon War of 2256-57. It was present at the Battle of
the Binary Stars, surviving this conflict and mobilised in several more battles against
the Klingon forces. In May of 2256, it took part in operation Riposte and not long after
was destroyed over Prior’s World with all hands. Official records, state that Captain
Lorca scuttled the vessel to prevent Klingon capture and was the only direct survivor.
Spoilers, but this is not the whole story. The next USS Buran we encounter is another
canon one, the USS Buran NCC-57580. This was a challenger-class vessel and it made two
appearances in TNG; both times as a wreck. You see it was one of the vessels that engaged
the Borg at Wolf 359 and out of the taskforce of forty vessels, 39, including the Buran
were destroyed. Not much was known about its history except its class of which two other
vessels, the USS Armstrong NCC-57537 and the USS Kearsarge NCC-57566 with bothe surviving
its destruction in late 2366. This Buran turned up again as one of the derelict
hulks at Surplus Depot Z15 a year later in the Qualor sector.
There is finally, the USS Buran of Star Trek Online, launched in 2410 which shares a similar
profile it its 2256 counterpart. This was termed the Buran-Class however and the NX-96400
was the first of its line. Its silhouette and occupation as a dreadnaught earned it
the nickname the “Battle-axe”. This vessel seems to have had enough of its prior namesakes
being blown up in combat and has found its fangs, being rather geared towards combat
and rapid target acquisition. Interestingly it came with a strange piece of equipment
that allowed it to create a localised Ion storm with itself as the eye as well as numerous
other exotic particle generators that could be tied into the main deflector. Reregistered
as NCC on its launch, it was under the command of Captain Th’Pev and Andorian and constructed
in Yard 39 in the Tellar Sector. During Th’Pev’s tour, she referenced that every Starfleet
vessel named the Buran had been destroyed in combat, listing Romulans, Klingons, Borg
and the Dominion. That last one suggests a second USS Buran of the 24th century following
the battle of Wolf 359, one that was lost to the Dominion.
In a nice addition, Captain Th’Pev also expresses delight at the name’s origin meaning
of a “Snowstorm” and feels it rather suitable that and Andorian be its first captain.
So given the mentions in memory beta content, this is an example of Star Trek actively addressing
a recurring trait of the legacy of the Vessel, that being, every vessel named the Buran has
been destroyed in combat, a far more noble, but no less tragic end than the original Buran.
Frequently throughout the name’s history too, we see that space planes have been a
common factor in naming the vessels and their classes. The NX vessels of the 2150s were
all named after the NASA shuttles, while the Columbia-class, itself a shuttle, shared space
plane names from other nations. Then we have Challenger-class vessels sporting the Buran
name again before its gets its own class namesake in Star Trek Online’s timeline.
Thanks for watching this short legacy video on the history the namesakes of the Buran.
From what I could tell, there were no actual vessels or ships of this name historically
but it would not surprise me considering the name simply means “snowstorm” in Russian
and I can easily picture a vessel named that. So until the next video thanks again for watching,
I’ve been Ric and I’ll see you next time! Goodbye!