On June 27, 2023, NASA’s Parker Solar Probe marked an important event: the 16th revolution around the Sun. This included a close approach to the Sun (known as perihelion) on June 22, 2023, when the spacecraft came within 8.3 million miles of the Sun’s surface, traveling at 364,610 miles per hour. The spacecraft came out of solar orbit healthy and normal.

On August 21, 2023, the Parker Solar Probe will pass by Venus for its sixth flyby of the planet. To prepare for the smooth course, the Johns Hopkins Laboratory of Applied Physics (APL) mission team performed a minor trajectory correction maneuver on June 7, 2023, the first course correction since March 2022. This flight will be the sixth of seven planned flights.

Venus during Parker’s primary mission. Parker uses Venus’ gravity to narrow its orbit around the Sun and create a future perihelion just 7.5 million miles from the Sun’s surface. As the sun becomes more active, this perihelion will be particularly important for studies of solar physics.

The Parker Solar Probe was developed as part of NASA’s Living With a Star program to investigate aspects of the Sun-Earth system that directly affect life and society. The Life with a Star program is administered by the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. APL designed, built and operated the spacecraft and managed the mission for NASA.