NASA’s groundbreaking Parker Solar Probe made history on Thursday (Sep 18) by successfully completing its 25th flyby of the Sun. The spacecraft confirmed this achievement by reestablishing communication with flight controllers at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland, after having operated autonomously and being out of contact with Earth during its close approach. Throughout the mission, the spacecraft matched its record-setting speed of 687,000 km per hour, a speed previously achieved during close encounters on December 24, 2024; March 22, 2025; and June 19, 2025. If this speed remains constant, the Parker Solar Probe would take just 61 seconds, or a little over a minute, to travel from Delhi to New York. In contrast, a nonstop flight currently takes between 15 to 17 hours to cover the distance from the Indian capital to the Big Apple. NASA has been conducting these flybys to collect ‘unmatched measurements’ of solar wind and solar activity while the Sun is in a more active phase of its 11-year cycle. The data from this latest encounter will begin transmission to Earth on Tuesday (Sep 23). Parker’s observations of solar wind and solar phenomena, including flares and coronal mass ejections, are essential for enhancing humanity’s understanding of the Sun and the events that drive high-energy space weather, which can pose risks to astronauts, satellites, air travel, and even power grids on Earth.
