The Ad Astra Rocket Laboratory located in Earth University at La Flor, has a new guest.

They are hosting a full sized model of the VF-200 engine, the same Franklin Chang and his team are building to fly to the International Space Station in 2015.

The prototype hangs just above the site that links to a model of the Aurora platform, a structure designed and built in Costa Rica to connect the motor with the Space Station.

It is a stunning image that allows those who see it to make a trip about three years into the future and visualize the plasma propulsion engine designed for flights to Mars and beyond.

The purpose for the construction of these models is to test the transfer and coupling process that these components must perform when making the trip into space.

The model of the engine will be in Costa Rica until early next year. They will build a small interface for each Aurora platform and then both structures will be shipped to another company laboratory located in Houston, Texas.

The model arrived on Friday the 29th at the Daniel Oduber airport aboard a DC-9 from NASA.

Scientists and engineers of the company were waiting, including Franklin Chang, who immediately approached the aircraft to address and greet the crew.

Kindergarten student, Bernardo Gutierrez Sardinal Carrillo, cheered and celebrated the arrival of the aircraft and the presence of the Costa Rican astronaut. What was first planned as a field trip to the new airport terminal became an even bigger event for these children.

Once they unloaded the model, which weights just over 661 lbs., they transported it to the lab located just a few kilometers from the airport. It was then positioned at it’s new temporary home.

The entire process took over three hours. It was not until after 4:30 P.M. that the staff of Ad Astra Rocket and the crew of NASA celebrated the accomplishment of the task.

Over the next several months, experts will design and build an interface that will link the model engine with the Aurora platform.

In the meantime, teams of scientist in Houston and Liberia will coordinate their effort to obtain a stable thermal state that will insure that the motor can operate continuously for long periods of time in space.

The preliminary design of the VF-200 engine will be complete by the end of 2012. The motor is scheduled to be delivered to the space station in 2015.