As NASA Prepares Itself for Another Solar Conjunction, Here’s Everything You Need to Know About it

Like every two years, a Solar Conjunction is scheduled to take place. On August 28, a Mars ‘solar conjunction’ is about to take place, posing a serious risk to its Red Planet exploration robots.

While the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has prepared itself for Solar Conjunction, it is necessary for a laymen to understand what is Solar Conjunction and how does it impact the aeronautical institution.

After every 26 months, when the Red Planet Mars and the Earth are on opposite sides of the Sun, communication between the two planets is disrupted. Therefore, a solar conjunction can be described as a phenomenon when a planet or other solar system object is on the opposite side of the Sun from the Earth. Talking about it from an Earth reference, the Sun will pass between the Earth and the object.

During a solar conjuction, the communication with any spacecraft becomes severely limited. This is because the Sun comes between the two objects, and interferes with the radio transmissions from the spacecraft to the planet Earth.

During the solar conjunction, NASA has asked its engineers to ‘hold off on sending commands’ until Mars moves into a position where radio signals from Earth can reach without any interference from the sun, which will also mean that there will be break in the process of communications being sent from Mars to Earth.