In the early hours of Sunday, September 4, Solar Orbiter flew by Venus for a gravity-assist maneuver that alters the spacecraft’s orbit, which will get it even closer to the Sun. As if trying to attract the orbiter’s attention as it cozied up to another body in the Solar System, the Sun flung an eno
‘ straight at the spacecraft and planet. It was just two days before their closest approach – and the data are revealing.
So far, Solar Orbiter has been confined to the same plane as the planets, but from February 2025 onwards, each encounter with Venus will increase its orbital inclination, causing it to ‘leap’ up from the plane of the Solar System to get a view of the Sun’s mysterious polar regions., when Solar Orbiter passed 12,500 km from the planet’s center, which is very roughly 6,000 km from its gassy ‘surface’. In other words, it passed a distance half the width of Earth.
“By trading ‘orbital energy’ with Venus, Solar Orbiter has used the planet’s gravity to change its orbit without the need for masses of expensive fuel. When it returns to the Sun, the spacecraft’s closest approach will be about 4.5 million km closer than before.”Data beamed back to Earth since Solar Orbiter encountered the solar storm shows how its local environment changed as the large CME whooshed by.
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