BRUSH, Colorado USA — It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand that former Brush student Travis McGee has become a success.

A lead systems engineer for United Launch Alliance (ULA), McGee is responsible for system performance requirements, integration of technical parameters and compatibility of all physical, functional and program interfaces of the three types of rockets ULA launches.

Former Brush student Travis McGee, who now works for the United Launch Alliance, right, donates a model rocket to Wayne Carlson of the Brush Area Museum and Cultural Center. Photo: Jesse Chaney.

During Friday’s Brush Area Museum and Cultural Center Sack Lunch Program, McGee explained just how fast a rocket can actually travel.

A rocket launched in 2006 for the “New Horizons” mission, he said, left the Earth’s atmosphere at a pace of 35,800 miles per hour.

“That’s just leaving the atmosphere,” he said.

The rocket increased to a speed of 47,000 miles per hour before it was sent on its trajectory to Pluto.

To give a comparison, McGee said it would take two minutes and 16 seconds to travel from Denver to New York City at this speed. The trip would take about three hours on a Boeing 757 traveling at top speed, he said.

To travel from Brush to Denver at 47,000 miles per hour, he said, it would take 6.1 seconds.

However, even at this speed, McGee said, it will take the rocket 9.5 years from launch time to travel from Earth to Pluto.

For a joint venture between the U.S. government and Google, McGee said, the ULA recently launched a satellite that will take high-resolution photographs of the Earth. He said the photos, which will be available for home use, will allow users to see items as small as a basketball.

“That’s military-grade resolution that’s going to soon become available through Google,” he said.

The three types of rockets McGee works with are the smaller Delta II, the intermediate Atlas, and the large Delta IV, he said.

The Delta II can launch the weight of a typical sedan, the Atlas could carry a Humvee, and the Delta IV could carry a school bus into space, McGee said.

Rockets are designed to be as light and streamlined as possible, he said, and wings would only slow them down.

“Rockets don’t have wings because of the extra weight,” he said. “When you’re in space, obviously you don’t need wings because wings don’t do anything for you. You have to have atmosphere for wings to work.”

McGee said rockets can be propelled by solid, liquid or gas fuel or a combination of the three.

Once solid rocket fuel is ignited, he said, it cannot be stopped until all has been used. Liquid and gas fuels can be used as they are needed, he said.

Rocket boosters typically use liquid fuel, McGee said, and gasses are used to perform detailed maneuvers in space. Gas fuel is never used to launch rockets out of the Earth’s atmosphere, he said.

“Usually you have to use a liquid because that’s where you can get the most bang for your buck,” he said.

McGee entered the rocket science field as an Air Force officer during one tour at Hill Air Force Base in Utah, where he managed the second stage of a propulsion replacement program for the Minuteman III missile. His second tour was at Los Angeles Air Force Base in California, where he was a systems engineer on a complex trade study and system architecture of a space-based laser concept.

Before joining the ULA, McGee was the lead project engineer of the propulsion system for the Exo-atmospheric Kill Vehicle Divert and Attitude Control System at Aerojet.

He holds a master’s degree in aerospace engineering and a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering.

McGee is the son of Jan and Terry McGee of Brush.

Copyright © 2008, The Fort Morgan Times.