mission-touch-sun-spacecraft-size-small-car-trave-q62996100″ title=”(35P) NASA’s Sun“>Parker Solar Probe will be the | Chegg.com”>Parker Solar Probe to Set Historic Record: Speeding Towards the Sun’s Corona
NASA’s solar probe, the Parker Solar Probe, is poised to create history on Tuesday as it hurtles towards the Sun’s outer atmosphere, the corona, in a groundbreaking mission to deepen our understanding of our closest star.
"Never before has a human-made object gotten this close to a star, so Parker is really going where no spacecraft has gone before," said Nick Pinkine, mission operations manager at Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, in a NASA blog post.
The spacecraft is currently on course to travel as close as 3.8 million miles (6.1 million kilometers) from the Sun’s surface by 6:53 AM EST (11:53 GMT). Due to the probe’s Communications Blackout, mission operators won’t confirm its status until Friday, post the close approach.
The Parker Solar Probe is traveling at speeds up to 430,000 mph (692,000 kph) and will endure temperatures up to 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit (982 degrees Celsius), according to NASA.
When the spacecraft first encountered the Sun’s atmosphere in 2021, it revealed new insights about the edge of the solar atmosphere and captured close-up images of the corona’s structures, visible during solar eclipses.
Since its launch in 2018, the spacecraft has gradually orbited closer to the Sun, using Venus’s gravity to finesse its trajectory. One of its instruments has even captured visible light from Venus, providing scientists a novel way to peer through the planet’s thick clouds to its surface below.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.
