Energia was one heck of a booster. It performed flawlessly on both of its flights before the program was cancelled due to lack of funds. (A magnificent booster, but an expensive one too.) Energia was what put the Buran space shuttle into orbit for its single, unmanned, test flight.<br /><br />Polyus did not make it into orbit. Although the Energia performed correctly, but the Polyus itself, which had its own thruster package for orbit insertion, failed to fire properly due to a sensor malfunction. Polyus is at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean today, probably in quite a few pieces. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p> </p><p><font color="#666699"><em>"People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint it's more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly . . . timey wimey . . . stuff."</em> -- The Tenth Doctor, "Blink"</font></p> </div>