Azerbaijan National Academy of Sciences

The closest point Parker recently reached is called perihelion. This happened around 4:23 a.m. on June 7, when the probe was about 17.7 million kilometers from the surface of the Sun and moved at a speed of more than 393,000 kilometers per hour relative to the star.

Having reached perihelion, the spacecraft managed to break its own record for the approach of an artificial object to our star.

The spacecraft began its fifth mission to observe the Sun on May 9, Parker will continue to work until June 28.

The Parker probe was launched on August 11, 2018 to examine the outer part of the atmosphere of the Sun, which is called the “corona”. The mission is to study the heat and energy that travel through the "crown", and to find out what accelerates the solar wind, which affects other planets so much.

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