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HomeTech/ScienceNASA halts Parker Solar Probe Launch, New Launch Date is Sunday, August...

NASA halts Parker Solar Probe Launch, New Launch Date is Sunday, August 12th

NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center

NASA - National Aeronautics and Space AdministrationGreenbelt, MD – The launch of a United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy rocket carrying the Parker Solar Probe spacecraft was scrubbed today due to a violation of a launch limit, resulting in a hold. There was not enough time remaining in the window to recycle.

The launch is planned for Sunday, August 12th, 2018 from Space Launch Complex-37 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. The forecast shows a 60 percent chance of favorable weather conditions for launch. The launch time is 2:31am CDT.

NASA scrubs Saturday morning launch of the Parker Solar Probe due to a glitch with the United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy Rocket. (NASA)
NASA scrubs Saturday morning launch of the Parker Solar Probe due to a glitch with the United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy Rocket. (NASA)

The NASA Parker Solar Probe Mission

NASA Parker Solar Probe Mission

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe will revolutionize our understanding of the Sun, our closest star. The spacecraft will use seven Venus flybys and 24 orbits over nearly seven years to gradually reduce its orbit around the Sun. The spacecraft will come close to 4 percent of the distance from the Sun to the Earth, and closer to the Sun’s surface than any spacecraft before it.

The spacecraft will fly into part of the Sun’s atmosphere, known as the corona, for the first time. The spacecraft will use four instrument suites designed to study electric and magnetic fields, plasma, and energetic particles, as well as image the solar wind. The mission will trace how energy moves through the solar corona and explore what accelerates the solar wind and solar energetic particles, enabling critical contributions to our ability to forecast changes in Earth’s space environment that impact life and technology on our planet.

Parker Solar Probe is part of NASA’s Living With a Star program to explore aspects of the Sun-Earth system that directly affect life and society. The Living With a Star flight program is managed by the agency’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington.

The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory implements the mission for NSA. Scientific instrumentation is provided by teams led by the Naval Research Laboratory, Princeton University, the University of California, Berkeley, and the University of Michigan.

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