Parker Solar Probe Survives Close Encounter with Sun’s Surface
NASA’s Parker Solar Probe recently achieved a major milestone by making its closest approach to the sun yet, NASA reported. The spacecraft zipped by within a record-breaking 3.8 million miles of the sun earlier this week, marking an incredible feat in space exploration. Parker sent a reassuring message back to NASA on Thursday night, confirming that it had successfully survived the intense journey.
Launched back in 2018, the Parker Solar Probe was designed to study the sun up close, and it did just that by flying through the sun’s crownlike outer atmosphere, known as the corona. Now that it has completed this daring mission, the spacecraft is expected to continue orbiting the sun at this distance until at least September.
Impressively, the Parker Solar Probe is the fastest spacecraft ever created by humans, reaching a staggering speed of 430,000 mph at its closest approach. Equipped with a top-notch heat shield capable of withstanding temperatures as high as 2,500 degrees Fahrenheit, the spacecraft is on a mission to help scientists unravel some of the sun’s biggest mysteries.
Researchers hope that the data collected from Parker will provide valuable insights into why the sun’s outer atmosphere is hundreds of times hotter than its surface and what causes the intense solar wind of charged particles that constantly flows away from the sun. Stay tuned for more updates as the Parker Solar Probe continues its groundbreaking journey into the heart of our solar system.
