Winning Team Gets Free Trip To The Johnson Space Center in Houston

The tenth annual Honeywell Fiesta Bowl Aerospace Challenge, held at the Challenger Space Center in Peoria, AZ, was won Friday by a team of seventh and eighth grade students from the Tempe Tri-City Christian Academy, as teams from six area schools competed by building models of next-generation space stations.

The winners will be honored Monday at the Fiesta Bowl and enjoy a free trip to the Johnson Space Center in Houston.

Winning team members Caleb Hill, Sydney Trogen, Mikalia Whitehouse, Melissa Larsen, and Kristian Charboneau dubbed their team "HEAT," which stands for Heavens and EArth Team, The Arizona Republic reported.

HEAT began their efforts last August, making detailed plans and compiling their ideas into binders. Teacher and team coach Theresa Trogen said the actual construction of their models was started in September.

The entries were judged by a panel of Honeywell engineers and NASA astronauts, who quizzed the students about the various details of their projects, such as power sources and the uses of their space station.

The panel was impressed by the students' ingenious designs. "I thought it was great," astronaut Bob Behnken said. "I was really excited to see the thought and effort put into their projects, which were very workable."

The competition was not just about designing and building a space station and winning - it was also about having fun working together. "It was so exciting and unbelievable," Caleb said. "I can't wait to go to Houston and then tell everyone . . . about it."

FMI: www.azchallenger.org