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Comment by kweks | Hacker News Reader

It's in "Baikonur", a 100km circle of real estate in Kazakhstan that is leased by Russia for its space program. The site is not abandoned, but definitely has abandoned pieces of infrastructure.

Getting caught in Baikonur is no joke, it's typically the FSB that respond. With that said, typically if you're not in active infrastructure, you'll "just" get booted out of Baikonur (or Russia, depending on their mood..)

Fun fact: another Buran sat in an abandoned lot in an Inner Sydney (Australia) suburb for many years.

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> Fun fact: another Buran sat in an abandoned lot in an Inner Sydney (Australia) suburb for many years.

That wasn't an actual Buran, it was a test vehicle used to test the handling of the aircraft for gliding and landing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OK-GLI

Great clarification. From what I understood the OK-GLI was still refered to (colloquially and officially) as a Buran, but absolutely, the buran that ended up in Australia is not the same as the one in the Baikonur hanger.

You can't be booted from Russia while you're in Kazakhstan (different countries). Also, FSB can't boot you from Kazakhstan either, that's why they handle trespassers to a local police and AFAIK they also can't.

How would one go about visiting Baikanor as a tourist?

There are a few organisations that arrange tours. ( https://duckduckgo.com/?q=baikonur+cosmodrome+tour&t=h_&ia=w... )

You need ROSCOSMOS permission, and a double entry Russian visa (you typically fly to Russia (one entry).. fly to Baikonur, and then fly back to Russia.

From what I understand, the tour is quite near, and you can stay in the famous Sputnik hotel. You can also time.it right to be on site for a launch.

In terms of seeing the Buran/s, you cannot officially visit. You essentiallywalk on a straight line across the desert avoiding detection to get to the hangar. It's entirely a different type of adventure in itself.

yes, must love CNN and their 'objective news' for making it seem like an abandoned ghost town, despite the fact that NASA launches from there because we gutted our own space program.

but don't worry, elon will fix everything. if he can only get past the endless stream of 'boring questions' first..

>must love CNN and their 'objective news' for making it seem like an abandoned ghost town, despite the fact that NASA launches from there because we gutted our own space program.

Don't just fabricate nonsense. 5th sentence in the article:

"It's an active spaceport about 1,500 miles southeast of Moscow, still used today to send and retrieve astronauts from the International Space Station."

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