A United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy rocket launched NASA’s Parker Solar Probe on 12 August 2018 at 3:31 a.m. from Space Launch Complex 37 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Parker Solar Probe is humanity’s first mission to the sun. After launch, it will orbit directly through the solar atmosphere – the corona – closer to the surface than any human-made object has ever gone. While facing brutal heat and radiation, the mission will reveal fundamental science behind what drives the solar wind, the constant outpouring of material from the sun that shapes planetary atmospheres and affects space weather near Earth. Click to view my Parker Solar Probe Launch Gallery.