Austin-made parts, signatures headed to space station – The Decatur Daily

The signatures of 21 Austin High School students are going to the International Space Station, along with parts made by the schools machine tool technology class.

I was like, 'Wow,' senior Ryan Anthony said when NASA representative Bob Zeeke brought a space station locker to the school Monday morning.

Zeeke is program manager of NASAs HUNCH program (High schools United with NASA to Create Hardware) and made the visit to Austin because students at the school milled the stainless steel stud latch bolts that hold lockers in place.

He said 11 schools were involved with creating the lockers, but Austin is the only one from Alabama involved with the program.

Zeeke said the locker students signed could be on the space station as early as October. He said this is the second of 15 lockers students built and that it will go into NASAs secured inventory sometime this month.

The standards and quality of work here are spot on, Zeeke said about Austins program receiving flight status from NASA.

Johnson Space Center started the HUNCH program in 2003 as a way to give high schools students the opportunity for hands-on experience through applying science, technology, engineering and mathematics skills.

Austins first success came when students were selected to design and manufacture training and flight-certified hardware for NASA astronauts.

NASA provided materials, equipment and mentoring, but students designed and fabricated products for the International Space Station training center.

In 2015, Austin students were selected to design and assemble handrails, which are scattered throughout the space station and double as places where astronauts tie down cargo.

A year later, the schools relationship with NASA changed significantly when Austin received flight status, which means students could make parts used on the space station.

Students made 55 stainless steel stud latch bolts, which are part of the locker door mechanical latching system, and 10 aluminum flight extravehicular activity threaded brush tools astronauts use during space walks. Astronauts use brush tools to clean and lubricate threaded sockets outside the space station.

Austin was part of the HUNCH program 13 years before its parts got into space.

Colton Sandlin, a junior, was the first to sign the locker.

Tenth-grader Haley Dobbs was the only female student to sign the locker.

I didnt know about this until the morning, but its cool to be part of something going into space, she said.

Teacher Bill Gibson, who worked in the aerospace machining business before coming to Austin more than 35 years ago, said its rewarding when students get to see their hard work gain recognition.

Its about them, he said about the students as they one by one signed the locker and posed for pictures.

Zeeke said its possible that the locker could return to Austin after it has been used on the space station, but his goal is to get pictures of the locker on the space station with astronauts.

That would be cool and something to show people, senior Aaron McAbee said.

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Austin-made parts, signatures headed to space station - The Decatur Daily