NASA solar probe to fly closer to sun than any human-made object

NASA's Parker Solar Probe is expected to make a fiery dive close to the solar surface on the morning of Christmas Eve.

NASA is preparing to “taste” the sun on Christmas Eve.

The agency’s Parker Solar Probe is days away from making its closest-ever approach to the sun on Tuesday, swooping nearer to our star than any other human-made object in history.

The spacecraft, which is about the size of a small car, is set to dive within 3.86 million miles of the solar surface at 6:40 a.m. ET on Tuesday. It will fly by at about 430,000 mph, according to NASA.

“If you can imagine, it’s like going 96% of the way there to the sun’s surface,” said Kelly Korreck, a program scientist in NASA’s heliophysics division.

Mission controllers won’t be able to communicate with the probe during the maneuver, so NASA will have to wait about three days to pick up a signal that the spacecraft survived its rendezvous with the sun.

https://www.nbcnews.com/science/space/nasa-parker-solar-probe-fly-close-sun-rcna184500

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