Historic event: NASA probe, considered the fastest object in the world, touched the Sun

On December 24, a NASA spacecraft made history by approaching the Sun closer than any spacecraft before. This record was achieved by the Parker Solar Probe.

The NASA probe, which is considered the fastest object in the world, flew at a distance of 6.1 million kilometers from the sun, withstanding the terrible heat of the outer atmosphere of our star, the corona. This flight was the 22nd time Parker was so close to the sun, Space writes.

However, it is not yet known whether Parker survived, as NASA had to lose contact with the spacecraft during this flyby. The first proof that everything went well will come on December 27, the agency reports.

"No human-made object has ever passed this close to a star, so Parker will really be returning data from uncharted territory," says Nick Pinkin, Parker Solar Probe mission manager at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL).

The spacecraft that touched the sun was traveling at 692,000 km/h, breaking its previously set speed record. For comparison, this is about 300 times faster than the top speed of a Lockheed Martin jet fighter here on Earth. This incredible feat of speed was achieved with the help of seven gravitational "boosts" from Venus flybys, the last of which took place in November 2024.

But breaking records is only a side effect of Parker's main mission: to collect more data about the solar corona by flying as close as possible through the stellar atmosphere. In particular, the spacecraft had to withstand temperatures of 980 degrees Celsius. Since gravitational attraction is so strong at this distance, the probe must move incredibly fast to avoid slipping into the heart of the Sun, MailOnline writes.

Scientists hope that these data will help solve the long-standing mystery of the Sun's outer atmosphere, which has bothered them for decades. The so-called "coronal heating problem" refers to the fact that, despite the fact that the corona is farther away from the Sun's main energy source (its core), it is much hotter than the Sun's surface, the photosphere.

Parker will continue its mission by making a flyby of the sun on March 22, 2025, followed by its last scheduled flyby on June 19, 2025. During both of these approaches, the spacecraft will approach the sun almost as close as it was on Christmas Eve, when it was traveling at the same speed.

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