NASA on Sunday blasted off its first-ever spaceship to explore the Sun, the $1.5 billion Parker Solar Probe, on a strategic mission to protect the Earth by unveiling the mysteries of dangerous solar storms.
The launch of the car-sized probe aboard a massive Delta IV-Heavy rocket lit the night sky at Cape Canaveral, Florida at 3:31 am (0731 GMT).
The unmanned spacecraft’s mission is to get closer than any human-made object ever to the center of our solar system, plunging into the Sun’s atmosphere, known as the corona, during a seven-year mission.
The probe is guarded by an ultra-powerful heat shield that can endure unprecedented levels of heat, and radiation 500 times that experienced on Earth.
