NASA’s Parker Solar Probe flew within 3.8 million miles of the sun’s surface on Christmas Eve, setting the record for the closest solar approach ever.
It managed this with the spacecraft, the size of a car, making a record as the fastest-ever object engineered by man, moving at an incredible speed of 430,000 fast enough to get from New York to Tokyo in less than a minute. This mission is yet another milestone in humanity’s effort to unlock the secrets of our nearest star.
Launched in 2018, the Parker Solar Probe has a mission to study the atmosphere of the sun, called the corona, and investigate why this outer layer is hotter than the sun’s surface. It also aims to learn the source of the solar wind streams of charged particles emitted by the sun and develop ways to forecast solar storms that can knock out power grids and radio signals on Earth.
Nicola Fox, associate administrator for NASA Science Mission Directorate, has celebrated it as a “total ‘Yay! We did it!’ moment” to note the technological triumph that has kept Parker resilient under such extreme conditions this close to the sun. The spacecraft is designed to have an advanced heat shield that reflects light and allows absorption of heat while keeping its inside practically at room temperature, with temperatures on the outside reaching up to 1,700 degrees Fahrenheit.
Parker Solar Probe made history previously when, in 2021, it became the first spacecraft to enter the sun’s corona. Data obtained from the recent flyby will reach Earth in late January and will help scientists develop better ways of comprehending solar phenomena, thus enabling superior forecasting of solar activity.
The mission is named after the astrophysicist Eugene Parker, who predicted the existence of the solar wind back in the 1950s. It honors his work. Parker was the first living person to have a NASA mission named after him and attended the launch of the spacecraft in 2018; he died in 2022 at the age of 94.
This bold journey fundamentally changed our understanding of the sun and highlighted man’s resolve and ingenuity in conquering the most extreme frontiers of space.
