NASA's Parker Solar Probe is all set to complete its final Venus gravity assist manoeuvre on Wednesday. It will pass within 233 miles (376 km) of the planet's surface. The US space agency said the flyby will adjust the spacecraft's trajectory into its final orbital configuration, bringing it to within 3.86 million miles of the solar surface by December 24, 2024. It will be the closest a human-made object has ever been to the Sun.
The Parker Solar Probe was launched in 2018 on the mission to "touch" the Sun. It is just about the size of a small car.
NASA said Parker Solar Probe's flybys around the planet have been a major success for new Venus science, especially with the chance discovery from its Wide-Field Imager for Parker Solar Probe, or WISPR.
At the time of its third Venus flyby on July 11, 2020, the scientists turned the instrument towards Venus hoping to track the changes in the planet's thick cloud cover.
“The WISPR cameras can see through the clouds to the surface of Venus, which glows in the near-infrared because it's so hot,” Noam Izenberg, a space scientist at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland said.
What next?
The images from WISPR in 2020 and 2021 flyby revealed Venus' surface in a new light. With the November 6 flyby, the scientists are planning to seek answers to the puzzling questions of previous flybys.
Izenberg said the upcoming event will help scientists "evaluate whether WISPR can help us distinguish physical or even chemical properties of Venus' surface".
Post the Venus flyby on November 6, the spacecraft will be on course coming within 3.8 million miles of the solar surface, the primary objective of the mission first conceived more than 65 years ago.
During this time, the spacecraft is expected to cut through plumes of plasma still connected to the Sun.
On December 24, 2024, the closest approach to the Sun will take place. During this time, the mission control will be out of contact with the spacecraft. After this, the spacecraft will send a beacon tone on December 27, 2024, to check on its health and confirm whether or not it was successful. It will continue to remain in this orbit for the remaining time in the mission and complete two more perihelia at the same distance.
