NASA’s Parker Solar Probe continues to renew the records it has broken during its Sun exploration efforts over the last few years. On its 17th close pass around our star, the spacecraft approached the Sun, up to 7.26 million kilometers from the Sun’s surface. This means it comes within about 10 times the radius of the Sun.
As the spacecraft approaches the Sun, its speed increases due to falling into a gravity well. The vehicle reached a speed of 635,266 kilometers per hour at its closest position, the fastest speed ever reached by a human-made object.
Perihelion, the closest position of an object to the Sun, is the midpoint of its encounter with the Sun. The Parker Solar Probe’s 17th Sun encounter occurred from September 22 to October 23, with perihelion occurring on September 27 at 7:28 PM EDT.
The mission sent a telemetry stream on October 1, and the data collected in this interaction will be transmitted to Earth by October 19. This transmission includes data collected about the solar wind, the flow of charged particles released by the Sun. The probe passes through the Sun’s corona, a region with incredibly high temperatures, to study how the solar wind is generated by the Sun.
Using Venus’s gravitational field, the spacecraft changed its orbit and passed even closer to the Sun. This was the sixth time the Parker Solar Probe successfully used Venus’s gravity to change orbit, passing by some 4,000 kilometers from the planet.
Parker will orbit the Sun every 92 days, maintaining that orbit for the next four perihelions. It will encounter Venus again on November 6, 2024, with a flyby just 317 kilometers from its surface.
This transit will place it in an even shorter orbit and bring it closer to the Sun. It will also push it to an even higher speed. However, this won’t happen until late December 2024. Parker proves to be a durable little spacecraft, managing to not only survive the corona but also survive without being caught in the explosive plasma releases known as coronal mass ejections.
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