Proba-3: India Launches ESA Mission for Unprecedented Solar Views | Quick Digest

Proba-3: India Launches ESA Mission for Unprecedented Solar Views | Quick Digest
Europe's Proba-3 mission, launched by India, is providing unparalleled views of the Sun's inner corona, capturing rare prominence eruptions through artificial eclipses. This landmark collaboration between ESA and ISRO marks a significant advancement in solar science.

ESA's Proba-3 mission successfully launched from India.

ISRO's PSLV-XL rocket carried the dual-satellite mission.

Proba-3 creates artificial solar eclipses for corona study.

Mission captures rare solar prominence eruptions, revealing solar dynamics.

Collaboration highlights India's pivotal role in global space exploration.

The European Space Agency's (ESA) Proba-3 mission, a pioneering dual-satellite endeavour, was successfully launched aboard the Indian Space Research Organisation's (ISRO) PSLV-XL rocket from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, India, on December 5, 2024. This significant collaboration demonstrates high-precision formation flying technology, with two satellites maintaining a precise 144-meter separation to create artificial solar eclipses in orbit. This unique capability allows the mission to observe the Sun's faint inner corona, which is typically obscured by the intense brightness of the solar disk during natural eclipses. The India Today article accurately reports on Proba-3's achievement in delivering breathtaking views of the Sun's inner corona. While the headline's phrase "shows Sun bursting with life like never before" is somewhat sensationalized, the mission has indeed captured rare and dynamic solar phenomena, such as prominence eruptions. For instance, a time-lapse animation from September 21, 2025, showed three prominence eruptions in just five hours, a rarity highlighted by ASPIICS coronagraph Principal Investigator Andrei Zhukov. These observations fill a crucial gap in solar studies, providing unprecedented insights into the Sun's atmosphere and helping to understand phenomena like coronal heating and solar wind acceleration. The partnership between ESA and ISRO for this mission underscores India's growing prominence and capabilities in international space research and technology.
Read the full story on Quick Digest