Good morning, friends, it’s your Space Coast correspondent James Sparvero, with the hottest holiday season you’ve ever heard of!
No, I don’t mean our local forecast. I’m talking about NASA’s Parker Solar Probe set to reach its closest point to the sun on Christmas Eve!
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The spacecraft launched here back in 2018 and then in 2021, the Parker Solar Probe “touched” the sun when NASA says it flew within the sun’s outer atmosphere, the corona (maybe you saw the corona for yourself during this year’s eclipse).
Now tomorrow, a NASA release says the spacecraft will fly just 3.8 million miles from the sun’s surface.
If that sounds far away, I heard one of the scientists working the mission put it like this. He said if the distance between the sun and the Earth were a football field, then the Parker Solar Probe is on the sun’s 4 yard line. In other words, first and goal!
During this closest approach ever by a flying object to a star, NASA expects to lose signal with the solar probe until Friday. Then, once the spacecraft confirms it made it OK, then the new scientific discoveries begin.
“No human-made object has ever passed this close to a star, so Parker will truly be returning data from uncharted territory” said Nick Pinkine, Parker Solar Probe mission operations manager at APL. “We’re excited to hear back from the spacecraft when it swings back around the sun.”
Here’s hoping the Parker Solar Probe has a safe holiday break. Merry Christmas and happy holidays to you, too!
📧 Do you have any specific space topics you’d like to discuss? Send me an email here.
👋 Here’s a little bit more about me.
Little did I know when watching Apollo 13 in the third grade that 20 years later, I was destined for a thrilling career as your Space Coast multimedia journalist.
Chemistry and biology weren’t so interesting to me in high school science, but I loved my Earth and Space class (Thanks, Mr. Lang).
Then in 2016, I traded Capitol correspondent in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, for space correspondent. I’m proud that my first live report at News 6 happened to be the first time SpaceX landed a Falcon 9 booster on a barge. What seems so routine now was a really big deal that day in our newsroom!
From there, I’ve covered the Commercial Crew program and the return of human spaceflight to Kennedy Space Center (Demo-2 launched on my 33rd birthday!)
Now, as our coverage looks forward to missions to the moon and Mars, I often tell others I have the best job in local news. Because after all I’ve seen so far, I think I would be bored working somewhere else. I even bought a house near the Cape with a great view to the north so I never miss a launch even when I’m not working.
After eight years on the beat, though, I still consider myself a young space reporter and I always look forward to learning something new with every assignment.
Have a great launch into the rest of your week!