NASA's Parker Solar Probe Smashes The Space Speed Record

 NASA's Parker Solar Probe recently smashed its own speed record and bettered its own record for the fastest ever man-made object. This spacecraft is making its way towards the Sun and recently changed its trajectory with a little help from the gravity of Venus.

This manoeuvre, in which a spacecraft uses the gravity of another celestial body, like a planet, to change its trajectory or to increase its speed without using much fuel is called a gravity assist.

This flyby of Venus was done on 21 August and helped the probe get even closer to the Sun, with it passing within 7.2 million km of the surface of the Sun. It is also, reportedly the closest man-made object to the Sun, according to NASA. This was also the spacecraft's 17th solar encounter.

An animation by NASA showing the path of the Parker Solar Probe. Source: NASA

The record of the fastest man-made object was also created on the same date, with the spacecraft reaching staggering speeds of 6,35,266 km/h (3,94,736 m/h). To give you a visualisation of how fast it is, note that the International Space Station completes one orbit of the Earth in 90 minutes. However, at this speed, the Parker Solar Probe would take only 3 minutes to do so. 

The Parker Solar Probe, launched in 2018, is on a 7 year long mission to uncover the mysteries of the corona of the Sun. The most intriguing and strange mystery is that the Sun's corona (outermost layer) is way hotter than the other layers below it, contrary to the fact that it is further away from the core, which is where the fusion reactions that power the Sun take place. 

However, unlike ISRO's Aditya L-1, which will observe the Sun from a fixed spot, the Parker Solar probe will travel around space, between the orbits of Earth, Venus and Mercury and will get closer to the Sun than Aditya L-1.

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Until next time,

Aarav Iyer

References:

(1) https://blogs.nasa.gov/parkersolarprobe/2023/09/28/for-the-record-parker-solar-probe-sets-distance-speed-marks-on-17th-swing-by-the-sun/

(2) https://www.space.com/nasa-parker-solar-probe-fastest-man-made-object-breaks-record