NASA Will Send $1.4 billion Spacecraft To Touch The Sun For The First Time To Read It Closely

While we are busy in our lives doing our daily chores, talking to each other or sharing some wisdom, working and many other things, Nasa will be launching a spacecraft early in the morning to ‘touch the Sun’ for the first time. Yes, this world is a big place and the scientists are doing their researches to know more about the things that we didn’t even bother to know.

This mission is called Parker Solar Probe which is made of $1.4 billion is aimed to edge with 6.4 million km of the searing hot star (Sun) close enough to study its atmosphere, solar winds, and other properties for which it has been sent.

The launch will take place from Cape Canaveral in Florida. It was about to take off today which means on Saturday (August 11) but has been postponed and planned for Sunday Launch because of weather permitting. However, Nasa has through August 23 to fire off its probe, which is expected to reach the sun a few months after launch.

The probe will ride on top of a United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy rocket, one of the most powerful operational launch vehicles on Earth. The rocket will then shoot the probe (craft) on a path towards Venus. Using Venus’s gravity it will fly closer to the sun each orbit while picking up speed in the process. You can watch the launch live on Space.com beginning at 3 a.m. (0700 GMT), courtesy of NASA.

According to Space.com, “During its seven-year, $1.5 billion mission, the Parker Solar Probe will study the sun’s incredibly hot outer atmosphere, called the corona, as well as the charged particles that flow off the star and into the solar system.”

To get there the spacecraft will need a high power kick and this will be provided by a two-stage United Launch Alliance (ULA) Delta IV Heavy rocket and a third stage manufactured by Northrop Grumman.

NASA’s officials said the August 11 launch window will remain open for about 65 minutes and if the mission can’t launch in that time window, a similar window will open Sunday (August 12) at 3:29 a.m. EDT (0729 GMT). Daily windows will continue through August. 23. Yesterday (August 9), NASA officials said at a news conference that the weather forecast suggested a 30-percent chance of weather interfering with the launch on August 11, with a slightly more ominous 40-percent chance of weather troubles on August 12.