<a href="https://blogs.nasa.gov/parkersolarprobe/" rel="nofollow">https://blogs.nasa.gov/parkersolarprobe/</a> has good information and a graphic illustrating the orbits of the probe.<p>BTW, "touches the sun" means 6.5 million miles away. To try to put that in perspective:<p>"One astronomical unit (AU) represents the mean distance between the Earth and our sun. An AU is approximately 93 million miles (150 million km). It's approximately 8 light-minutes." [0]<p>The probe at its closest orbit will be orbiting at very approximately 1/14 of an AU. And (again very approximately) 34 light-seconds from the Sun.<p>0 - <a href="https://earthsky.org/space/what-is-the-astronomical-unit" rel="nofollow">https://earthsky.org/space/what-is-the-astronomical-unit</a>
I can't stand it when popular articles quote spacecraft speeds in mph or km/h. It's supposed to be more relatable to laypeople, obviously, but it's <i>not</i>.<p>What does hundreds of thousands of mph mean to me? Nothing; there's nothing in ordinary life to compare to. Miles (or km) per <i>second</i>, now that <i>does</i> create a picture. I also can vaguely recall the order of magnitude of earth orbital speed in mi/s, as well as the speed of light.