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Spacecraft · evidence and sources

Parker Solar Probe

NASA mission to study the Sun's corona. Will come within 6.2 million km of the Sun's surface, the closest any spacecraft has ever been.

JPL Horizons · to Dec 2029 Trajectory basis, the same label the app shows on the selection card.

Open in Space Time

Every aspect, with its origin

One record per aspect. The origin says what kind of thing each value is; the source says where it came from; the limit says what it cannot tell you.

ObservedCatalogComputedReconstructedIllustrativeUndocumented
Trajectory Catalog

Trajectory from Horizons state vectors

Parker Solar Probe's position is interpolated between 4,143 heliocentric state-vector samples from JPL Horizons that run through 2029-12-15. Past the last sample the marker holds its final position.

SourceJPL Horizons · record parker-solar-probe
Epoch2018-08-13 to 2029-12-15
MethodJ2000 equatorial, Sun-centred position samples baked at author time by scripts/bake-trajectories.mjs; the app interpolates linearly between adjacent samples.
UncertaintyHorizons state vectors are precise to the metre scale; linear interpolation between samples adds an error that grows with the sample spacing (days for cruise, minutes around flybys).
LimitPosition only. Spacecraft attitude (which way it points) is not modelled, and no covariance is stored.
Physical data Catalog

Bulk properties

Parker Solar Probe: mass 6.850 × 10^2 kg. These values are bundled with the object record and drive the rendered size.

SourceJPL Horizons
Appearance Reconstructed

Close-up hull model

The close-up shows a published 3D model scaled to 3 m spacecraft height. NASA Visualization Technology Applications and Development (VTAD).

SourceNASA 3D Resources · record parker-solar-probe
MethodSpace Time normalises the source model to the published deployed dimension.
LimitSource-asset presentation pose; time-dependent flight attitude is not modeled.
Description Undocumented

Description and facts

The short description and the fact list are written by the Space Time authors for orientation. They are not quoted from a catalog field and carry no citation of their own.

SourceSpace Time editorial text
LimitBackground reading is linked under Further reading; it is not the source of the displayed numbers.

Trajectory coverage: 2018-08-13 to 2029-12-15 (4,143 samples). Outside that window the marker holds its last known position.

What is not measured

  • Appearance: a reconstruction from measurements, not a direct observation. Close-up hull model. Source-asset presentation pose; time-dependent flight attitude is not modeled.

Not yet documented

  • Description: Background reading is linked under Further reading; it is not the source of the displayed numbers.

Dataset freshness

Snapshots this page depends on, read from the generated manifests at request time.
DatasetLast refreshedHorizonAutomated
Spacecraft trajectories (baked keyframes)
JPL Horizons
 no snapshot date Per craft: each evidence page states the first and last sample date No, refreshed by hand
scripts/bake-trajectories.mjs

Sources cited

Further reading

Wikipedia: Parker Solar Probe (background only; not the source of the displayed numbers)

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Space Time is a free 3D universe explorer by Point Dynamics. Origins: how to read these pages.