Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!ihlpl!knudsen
From: knudsen@ihlpl.ATT.COM (Knudsen)
Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle
Subject: What's Wrong with this Picture?
Keywords: Soviet Shuttle
Message-ID: <6981@ihlpl.ATT.COM>
Date: 30 Sep 88 18:33:16 GMT
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories - Naperville, Illinois
Lines: 22

Amongst all the photos of our re-entry into space,
there was one of the shuttle stack sitting on the pad.
It was a little funny:
(1) The gantry didn't look quite like any angle Id seen
(2) The ET was a bit skinny
(3) The booster fairings, instead of conical crayon points,
were dovetailed into the ET (a good idea, seems to me)
(4) Some kids had spray-painted "CCCP" on the port wing.

Well, you can guess that the caption said "First released
photo of the new Soviet shuttle."  It's nice to know Xerox
sells to the Soviets, or was it Sharp?  No, Toshiba of course!

I knew there shuttle was similar to ours, but not only is
the orbiter the same shape, but even the color scheme is the same,
with black leading edges and all!

Kidding aside, have I read on this newsgroup
that their boosters are liquid fueled?  The caption referred
to them as Energias.
Do they use tiles?  I know they throw titanium around like
plastic (whole submarines with titanium hulls).