Building A Probe That Will Survive A Trip To The Sun
The Parker Solar Probe is going to go closer to the sun than any spacecraft has come before. It will take seven years to fly 93 million miles to reach the sun’s corona, its outermost atmosphere. The probe will withstand temperatures up to 2,500º F as it gathers data about how energy and heat travel through the corona and what’s up with solar wind. We meet the engineer whose work on the heat shield will protect the probe from being burnt to a crisp as it makes history.
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