Hypersonic Tunnel Facility, who knew?

We've marveled at what our grandparents and great-grandparents accomplished at the NASA Plum Brook Station. They built the B-2 Spacecraft Propulsion Research Facility, the world's only facility capable of testing full-scale, upper-stage launch vehicles and rocket engines under simulated high-altitude conditions, and the Space Power Facility, the world's largest space environment vacuum chamber. The 6,400-acre NASA Plum Brook also has the Hypersonic Test Facility, which the U.S. Department of Defense wants to spend $20 million to upgrade to be fully functional and usable.U.S. Rep. Marcy Kaptur — long a champion for NASA Plum Brook — announced the funding is on its way to being fully approved. But, what is a Hypersonic Test Facility? According to NASA, it was originally designed to "test nuclear thermal rocket nozzles, is a hypersonic (Mach 5, 6, and 7) blowdown, nonvitiated freejet facility that tests large-scale hypersonic air-breathing propulsion systems."While not fully understanding what that means, we can observe what a fantastic asset Plum Brook is to our region. There is nothing more high-tech we know of than that, right there, whatever that means, for which NASA provided further clarification."Its experimental infrastructure includes a shop area for fabrication of materials for facility subsystems and assembly of customer hardware. Due to the high-energy nature of the facility, it is operated remotely from a control room approximately one-quarter mile from the actual facility."We're sure some readers can fully understand what it is. What we understand, and what we're grateful for, is the enormous investment — tens of millions of dollars — the federal government has re-invested in the station over the last decade, or so.We're grateful, too, for the Friends of NASA Plum Brook, a group of local leaders who saw this diamond in the rough and helped convince the world of its value, spurring that investment. The flight plan to Mars will go through Sandusky because of the foresight of our ancestors and the vision of these current leaders, who lobbied without fail to tout the amazing assets that have been right here for decades.***"That's one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind." Do you remember where you were when you heard those words the first time? Who were you with and what you thought when a man from Ohio planted his foot on the dusty crust of the moon? Do you have a story to tell about a friend or family and how it impacted your view of the world? Send us your photos and tell us about it for our 50th anniversary coverage. "Space Race, A Legacy of Exploration," a 32-page keepsake section in the Register and Reflector in July. Contact reporter Andy Ouriel at 419-625-5500, or email him at andyouriel@sanduskyregister.comDirect connect configuration of the interior of the Hypersonic Tunnel Facility.