WHAT’S THE STORY?

THE space craft that will travel closer to the sun than any other man-made object finally lifted off from Cape Canaveral in Florida in the early hours of yesterday morning.

The Parker Solar Probe’s launch had been delayed by 24 hours because of technical problems, but the US Nasa space agency reported that the Probe lifted off yesterday morning at 3.31am local time aboard a powerful United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy rocket.

There were spectacular pictures as the rocket soared ahead of a trail of orange flame in the darkened sky.

It has taken almost 60 years to make the mission a reality. Only major advances in thermal engineering have made it possible.

After the successful launch, a no doubt relieved Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator of Nasa’s Science Mission Directorate, said: “This mission truly marks humanity’s first visit to a star that will have implications not just here on Earth, but how we better understand our universe.

“We’ve accomplished something that, decades ago, lived solely in the realm of science fiction.”

WHAT WILL IT DO?

THROUGHOUT its seven-year mission to boldly go where no man-made object has ever gone before, the Parker Solar Probe will make 24 total passes by the sun, journeying steadily closer to it until it makes its ‘kiss’ at 3.8 million miles into the mission.

At that point, the Probe will be moving at 430,000 mph, and will become the fastest-moving object ever made by humans.

First it will fly by Venus in about two to three months time, when Parker will get its first gravity assist, probably in early October. Nasa describes a gravity assist as being “a manoeuvre a bit like a handbrake turn that whips the spacecraft around the planet, using Venus’s gravity to trim the spacecraft’s orbit tighter around the sun”.

Parker will then go into position in early November to fly to 15 million miles from the sun right within the solar atmosphere, known as the corona.

That is far closer than any man-made object has ever gone before and survived. Eventually Parker will dip down to just 3.8 million miles from the sun’s surface.

Dr Nicky Fox, the British-born project scientist who is affiliated to the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory said: “I realise that might not sound that close, but imagine the sun and the Earth were a metre apart. Parker Solar Probe would be just 4cm away from the sun.

The top speed of Parker would enable it to travel from Scotland to Australia in about a minute.

WHY IS IT SO IMPORTANT?

APART from being the source of life on Earth, the sun has a huge influence on our daily lives, Nasa hopes that Parker will study the physics of the corona, the place where much of the important activity that affects the Earth seems to originate.

The questions posed by Nasa are these: “Parker Solar Probe will set its sights on the corona to solve long-standing, foundational mysteries of our sun.

“What is the secret of the scorching corona, which is more than 300 times hotter than the sun’s surface, thousands of miles below?

“What drives the supersonic solar wind – the constant stream of solar material that blows through the entire solar system? And finally, what accelerates solar energetic particles, which can reach speeds up to more than half the speed of light as they rocket away from the sun?

Nasa added: “The mission’s findings will help researchers improve their forecasts of space weather events, which have the potential to damage satellites and harm astronauts on orbit, disrupt radio communications and, at their most severe, overwhelm power grids.”

IS THERE NOT A EUROPEAN SUN PROBE TOO?

INDEED there is. The European Space Agency is currently finalising – in Britain – the Solar Orbiter which is also expected to last seven years and will also use gravity assists from Venus to take it into an orbit around the sun.

That orbit will be different to Parker’s and will enable observations of the sun’s poles.

The Agency will work with Nasa to get the most comprehensive survey of the sun ever.

According to the European Space Agency, Solar Orbiter will have a nearly identical rotation period as the sun for several days, allowing scientists to — for the first time — see solar storms develop from close range.

WHO IS PARKER NAMED AFTER?

ASTRONOMER Professor Eugene Parker was pooh-poohed by the scientific establishment when he first claimed that the sun was ‘out-gassing’ as along ago as 1958. His theories were soon proven to be correct, however, and serious study of the sun and its corona took off.

Now the University of Chicago professor has had the last laugh with the probe named after him – the first living person to be so honoured.

A plaque dedicating the mission to Parker was attached to the spacecraft in May. It includes a quote from the man himself – “Let’s see what lies ahead.” The Parker Solar Probe also contains a memory card containing more than 1.1 million names submitted by the public to travel with the spacecraft to the sun.

After watching the lift-off from the scene, 91-year-old Prof Young said he had been biting his nails. He exclaimed: “Wow, here we go! We’re in for some learning over the next several years.”

We certainly hope so, Prof.