Circa 2018
In just a few weeks, NASA is due to launch one of its most ambitious projects yet. The Parker Solar Probe is going to swoop in and ‘touch’ the Sun — coming in closer to the solar surface than any probe has ever done before.
Parker’s three closest orbits will bring it within 6.1 million kilometres (3.8 million miles) of the Sun’s surface and inside its outer atmosphere, or corona, where temperatures reach millions of degrees Kelvin.
It does have heat shielding, and it’s actually pretty wicked, but we’ll get into that later. Because first, we have to address those searing temperatures.
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