Durable Parker Solar Probe going strong after first five years

On Aug. 12, 2018—five years ago this week—NASA's Parker Solar Probe blasted off atop a powerful Delta IV rocket from what is now Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. The predawn launch into the skies over the Florida coast marked the start of a game-changing mission to unlock the secrets of the solar wind—and the culmination of decades of development to craft a robotic explorer able to withstand the heat and radiation near the sun like no other spacecraft before it.