NASA’s Parker Solar Probe sets new record for sun proximity

Operations teams have confirmed NASA’s mission to “touch” the sun survived its record-breaking closest approach to the solar surface on Dec. 24, 2024.

Breaking its previous record by flying just 3.8 million miles above the surface of the sun, NASA’s Parker Solar Probe hurtled through the solar atmosphere at a blazing 430,000 miles per hour—faster than any human-made object has ever moved. A beacon tone received late on Dec. 26 confirmed the spacecraft had made it through the encounter safely and is operating normally.

This pass, the first of more to come at this distance, allows the spacecraft to conduct unrivaled scientific measurements with the potential to change our understanding of the sun.

“Flying this close to the sun is a historic moment in humanity’s first mission to a star,” said Nicky Fox, who leads the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “By studying the sun up close, we can better understand its impacts throughout our solar system, including on the technology we use daily on Earth and in space, as well as learn about the workings of stars across the universe to aid in our search for habitable worlds beyond our home planet.”

Parker Solar Probe has spent the last six years setting up for this moment. Launched in 2018, the spacecraft used seven flybys of Venus to gravitationally direct it ever closer to the sun. With its last Venus flyby on Nov. 6, 2024, the spacecraft reached its optimal orbit. This oval-shaped orbit brings the spacecraft an ideal distance from the sun every three months—close enough to study our sun’s mysterious processes but not too close to become overwhelmed by the sun’s heat and damaging radiation. The spacecraft will remain in this orbit for the remainder of its primary mission.

“Parker Solar Probe is braving one of the most extreme environments in space and exceeding all expectations,” said Nour Rawafi, the project scientist for Parker Solar Probe at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), which designed, built, and operates the spacecraft from its campus in Laurel, Maryland. “This mission is ushering a new golden era of space exploration, bringing us closer than ever to unlocking the sun’s deepest and most enduring mysteries.”

Close to the sun, the spacecraft relies on a carbon foam shield to protect it from the extreme heat in the upper solar atmosphere called the corona, which can exceed 1 million degrees Fahrenheit. The shield was designed to reach temperatures of 2,600 degrees Fahrenheit—hot enough to melt steel—while keeping the instruments behind it shaded at a comfortable room temperature. In the hot but low-density corona, the spacecraft’s shield is expected to warm to 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit.

“It’s monumental to be able to get a spacecraft this close to the sun,” said John Wirzburger, the Parker Solar Probe mission systems engineer at APL. “This is a challenge the space science community has wanted to tackle since 1958 and had spent decades advancing the technology to make it possible.”

By flying through the solar corona, Parker Solar Probe can take measurements that help scientists better understand how the region gets so hot, trace the origin of the solar wind (a constant flow of material escaping the sun), and discover how energetic particles are accelerated to half the speed of light.