Russia’s space shuttle flew only one mission

I WAS really saddened by the death of Chuck Berry last week.

I’ve been a big fan for as long as I care to remember, and my favourite song is No Particular Place To Go.

However, there is a line in it that has always confused me: “Ridin’ along in my calaboose, still trying to get her belt unloose.

“All the way home I held a grudge, for the safety belt that wouldn’t budge.”

What on earth is a calaboose? – R.

Calaboose is a slang term for a prison.

In the song, the narrator sings of cruising along in his car with his girlfriend, only to find her seat belt wouldn’t open.

The song was released in 1964, reaching No. 3 in the UK charts.

ON a trip to the Royal Air Force Museum (which is excellent, by the way) at RAF Cosford, one display in particular intrigued me.

It was all about the Space Race between the USA and Russia.

The video shown mentioned that Russia had its own version of the Space Shuttle, which I had never heard of. Please tell me more! – S. Buran (Russian for “blizzard” or “snowstorm”) was the first spaceplane to be produced as part of the Soviet Russian Buran programme.

On November 15, 1988, Buran was lifted into space on an unmanned mission by the specially designed Energia rocket.

The Energia rocket lifted the vehicle into a temporary orbit before the orbiter separated.

After boosting itself to a higher orbit and completing two circuits around the Earth, the engines fired automatically to begin a descent into the atmosphere, returning to the launch site.

Buran touched down – horizontally – 206 minutes after launch.

In May, 2002, the MIK 112 hangar at the Baikonur Cosmodrome collapsed, due to poor maintenance, during a massive storm in Kazakhstan.

The collapse killed eight workers and destroyed the Buran shuttle and the Energia rocket.