NASA’s Parker Solar Probe has reached a new record by traveling within 3.86 million miles of the sun’s surface on Christmas Eve, marking humanity’s closest-ever approach to a star and the fastest-ever human-made object breaking its speed record.
The spacecraft, no bigger than a small car, became the closest human-made object to the sun in history at 11:53 UTC on Tuesday, Dec. 24. This unprecedented close flyby was Parker’s 22nd visit to the sun, and it reached 96% of the distance between the sun and Earth – well within the orbit of Mercury.
The mission’s significance is likened to the moon landing in 1969 by Dr. Nour Raouafi, project scientist at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory. “It’s the moment we have been waiting for for nearly 60 years,” he said. “In 1969, we landed humans on the moon. On Christmas Eve, we embrace a star – our star.”
Parker will enter a “hyper-close regime” during its close approach to the sun, allowing it to cut through plasma plumes and pass inside a solar eruption. The heat the spacecraft will face is nearly 500 times hotter than the hottest summer day on Earth.
The probe was already the fastest object ever built on Earth, but its new record for speed means it can now travel at 430,000 mph (690,000 kph), breaking its previous records. Mission operators will lose contact with Parker for three days and wait for a beacon tone on Dec. 27, 2024, to confirm its survival.
Parker will make two more hyper-close passes at the same distance on March 22 and June 19, 2025. This historic achievement marks a monumental feat in space exploration, demonstrating humanity’s capabilities to push beyond previously thought limits.
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamiecartereurope/2024/12/24/nasa-spacecraft-touches-sun-in-defining-moment-for-humankind