SOLAR PROBE PLUS Is Alive and Well Following its Christmas Eve Encounter with our Host Star...

JHU / APL

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe Reports Successful Closest Approach to Sun (News Release)

Following its record-breaking closest approach to the Sun, NASA’s Parker Solar Probe has transmitted a beacon tone back to Earth indicating that it’s in good health and operating normally.

The mission operations team at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland received the signal just before midnight EST, on the night of December 26. The team was out of contact with the spacecraft during closest approach, which occurred on December 24, with Parker Solar Probe zipping just 3.8 million miles from the solar surface while moving about 430,000 miles per hour.

The spacecraft is expected to send back detailed telemetry data about its status on January 1.

This close-up study of the Sun allows Parker Solar Probe to take measurements that help scientists better understand how material in this region gets heated to millions of degrees, trace the origin of the solar wind (a continuous flow of material escaping from the Sun), and discover how energetic particles are accelerated to near light speed. Previous close passes have helped scientists pinpoint the origins of structures in the solar wind and map the outer boundary of the Sun’s atmosphere.

Parker Solar Probe was developed as part of NASA’s Living With a Star program to explore aspects of the Sun-Earth system that directly affect life and society. The Living With a Star program is managed by the agency’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. APL designed, built and operates the spacecraft, and manages the mission for NASA.

Source: NASA.Gov