NASA counts down to launch of spacecraft to ‘touch Sun’

Tampa : NASA counted down yesterday to the launch of a $1.5 billion spacecraft that aims to plunge into the Sun’s sizzling atmosphere and become humanity’s first mission to explore a star. The 65-minute launch window opens at 3:33 am (0733 GMT), and the weather forecast is 70 percent favorable for takeoff, NASA said. The probe’s main goal is to unveil the secrets of the corona, the unusual atmosphere around Sun.

“The Parker Solar Probe will help us do a much better job of predicting when a disturbance in the solar wind could hit Earth,” said Justin Kasper, one of the project scientists and a professor at the University of Michigan. The probe is protected by an ultra-powerful heat shield that is just 4.5 inches thick (11.43 centimeters). The shield should enable the spacecraft to survive its close shave with the center of our solar system, coming within 3.83 million miles (6.16 million kilometers) of the Sun’s surface.