By This Christmas Eve, while many gaze at the night sky in anticipation of Santa’s sleigh, a far more extraordinary traveler will be blazing its way through the cosmos. NASA’s Parker Solar Probe is preparing for an awe-inspiring journey as it makes an unprecedented flyby of our Sun—one that will push the boundaries of science, engineering, and human ingenuity.
At 6:40 a.m. Eastern Time on December 24th, the Parker Solar Probe will venture within a mere 3.8 million miles of the Sun’s surface, writes The New York Times. To put that in perspective, this is seven times closer than any spacecraft has ever dared to travel. Hurtling through the blazing corona—the Sun’s outer atmosphere—Parker will reach speeds of 430,000 miles per hour, securing its place as the fastest human-made object in history.
This flyby isn’t just another lap around our star. It represents a critical opportunity to study the Sun during its most volatile phase: the solar maximum, a peak in the Sun’s 11-year activity cycle. The Sun’s corona remains one of the most mysterious regions in our solar system. Its searing heat and chaotic magnetic fields challenge even our most advanced scientific understanding. Parker’s close proximity during this solar maximum could provide unprecedented data about coronal mass ejections (CMEs)—massive expulsions of solar plasma and magnetic energy—and the solar wind, a stream of charged particles that affects everything from Earth’s auroras to satellite communications.
Since its 2018 launch, Parker has already delivered jaw-dropping insights. It has captured detailed images of solar structures never seen before, gathered critical data on the origins and behavior of solar winds, and even made unexpected findings about Venus’s atmosphere during gravity-assist maneuvers. However, this upcoming flyby promises even more profound discoveries. Scientists hope to answer lingering questions, such as why the Sun’s corona is hotter than its surface, how magnetic fields influence solar wind acceleration, and how energy transfers across different layers of the Sun’s atmosphere.
At such extreme proximity, Parker Solar Probe faces temperatures nearing 2,000°F (1,093°C). Yet, thanks to its innovative 4.5-inch-thick carbon-composite heat shield, the spacecraft remains protected, with its delicate instruments kept at room temperature. Still, every flyby pushes the probe—and its technology—to its limits. After completing this daring maneuver, Parker will briefly fall silent, unable to communicate with mission control until December 27th. Scientists eagerly await this moment, as the spacecraft will then transmit its collected data back to Earth over several months.
NASA said Parker will begin sharing the data collected during its trip around the sun at the end of January.
“Until recently, we simply didn’t possess the technology. In 2018, that all changed with the launch of Parker Solar Probe,” Nour Rawafi, the project scientist for NASA’s Parker Solar Probe mission at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), explained on TED Radio Hour earlier this month.
He added, “It has revolutionized our understanding of the sun.”
Named after physicist Eugene Parker, who first theorized the existence of solar wind, the mission carries forward his legacy of scientific discovery. As families gather to celebrate the holiday season, a tiny spacecraft will be braving the fiery edge of our Sun, proving once again that our curiosity knows no bounds and our reach extends far beyond our home planet.
