December 23, 2024
NASA Solar Probe to Make Its Closest Ever Pass of Sun
Nasa's pioneering Parker Solar Probe is poised to make its closest-ever approach of the sun on Christmas Eve, a record-setting distance of 3.8 million miles (6.2 million kilometers) from the sun's surface.
Launched in August 2018, the spacecraft is on a seven-year mission to deepen scientific understanding of our star and enhance forecasts of space-weather events that can impact life on Earth.
The closest approach will occur on Tuesday, December 24, at 6:53 am EST (11:53 GMT).
To put this distance into perspective, if the distance from the Earth to the sun were represented as the length of an American football field, the probe would be just four yards from the end zone at its closest approach.
“This is an example of NASA's bold missions, something that no one else has done before, answering longstanding questions about our universe,” said Arik Posner, Parker Solar Probe program scientist. “We are eager to receive that first status update from the spacecraft and begin collecting scientific data in the forthcoming weeks.”
During this perihelion approach, mission teams will temporarily lose direct contact with the Parker Solar Probe, relying on a «beacon tone» this Friday to confirm the spacecraft's status.
Even though the heat shield will endure scorching temperatures of around 1,600 to 1,700 degrees Fahrenheit (870 to 930 degrees Celsius), the probe's internal instruments will remain near room temperature—around 85°F (29°C)—as it investigates the sun's outer atmosphere, known as the corona.
Moreover, Parker will be traveling at an astounding 430,000 miles per hour (690,000 kph), which is fast enough to fly from Washington, D.C. to Tokyo in less than a minute.
“No human-made object has ever passed this close to a star; thus, Parker will effectively be sending back data from uncharted territory,” commented Nick Pinkine, Parker Solar Probe mission operations manager at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland. “We are thrilled to receive data from the spacecraft when it swings back around the sun.”
By venturing into these extreme conditions, Parker is providing insights into some of the sun's greatest mysteries, including how the solar wind originates, the reason the corona is hotter than the surface below, and how coronal mass ejections—massive plasma clouds that are ejected into space—are formed.
This Christmas Eve flyby is the first of three record-setting close passes, with the subsequent two occurring on March 22, 2025, and June 19, 2025, both expected to bring Parker Solar Probe back to a similar distance from the sun.
© 2024 AFP
For more information
- NASA's Parker Solar Probe: How It's Redefining Our Understanding of the Sun Learn more
- The Revelation of Solar Wind Behavior via Parker Solar Probe Learn more
- Discoveries from Parker Solar Probe's Flybys and Analysis Learn more
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