Lifeboat Foundation

(NewsNation) —A NASA probe will fly within nearly 4 million miles of the sun’s surface.

The probe is expected to pass the sun 3.8 million miles from its surface on Christmas Eve this year, BBC News reported.

“This will be a monumental achievement for all humanity,” Parker project scientist Dr Nour Raouafi told BBC News. “This is equivalent to the Moon landing of 1969.”