# Flying to the sun **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 7, 2011, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861 "2011-10-07T03:18:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![drewder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/57b2e6/32.png) [@drewder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewder)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/1 "2011-10-07T03:18:25Z")
How close could I fly to the sun? What would be the first thing to kill me? Heat, Radiation, gravity? What could I do to mitigate the danger… SPF 5000? Once I got that close what would it take to get me out of the suns gravity? What if I substituted a red giant, pulsar, or blackhole? ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/2 "2011-10-07T03:19:19Z")
Your best bet would be to go at night. ---
**Author:** ![drewtwo99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d07c76/32.png) [@drewtwo99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewtwo99)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/3 "2011-10-07T04:28:01Z")
The first thing that will kill you is when you land on your head after thinking you can fly. ---
**Author:** ![Simplicio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c37758/32.png) [@Simplicio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simplicio)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/4 "2011-10-07T04:40:37Z")
Lack of air to breathe would probably become an issue pretty quickly. ---
**Author:** ![Dallas\_Jones](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dallas_jones/32/3277_2.png) [@Dallas\_Jones](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dallas_Jones)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 4:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/5 "2011-10-07T04:56:26Z")
You can fly until the Sun melts the wax that holds the feathers on your wings. ---
**Author:** ![Alka\_Seltzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c89c15/32.png) [@Alka\_Seltzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alka_Seltzer)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 9:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/6 "2011-10-07T09:08:12Z")
Are you travelling in a Buzz Lightyear’s space suit or the USS Enterprise? You’d be killed by either heat or radiation, depending on how much shielding you have against the two, how quickly you are approaching, and the prevailing solar conditions. I’d guess that in some scenarios the radiation from a [coronal mass ejection](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coronal_mass_ejection) might kill you before you got close enough to cook. A black hole won’t do anything to you until you get close enough for tidal forces to become significant (assuming there is no accretion disc around it), at which point you’d be [spagettified](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spagettiffication). Try to steer clear of [Magnetars](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetar), the magnetic field would be strong enough to wipe your brain at a considerable distance. I’m guessing the workings of your nervous system would be affected before your tissues were torn apart due to the dimagnetism of water. ---
**Author:** ![drewder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/57b2e6/32.png) [@drewder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewder)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 11:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/7 "2011-10-07T11:16:34Z")
> [@Alka\_Seltzer](#): > > Are you travelling in a Buzz Lightyear’s space suit or the USS Enterprise? You’d be killed by either heat or radiation, depending on how much shielding you have against the two, how quickly you are approaching, and the prevailing solar conditions. I’d guess that in some scenarios the radiation from a [coronal mass ejection](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coronal_mass_ejection) might kill you before you got close enough to cook. > > A black hole won’t do anything to you until you get close enough for tidal forces to become significant (assuming there is no accretion disc around it), at which point you’d be [spagettified](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spagettiffication). > > Try to steer clear of [Magnetars](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetar), the magnetic field would be strong enough to wipe your brain at a considerable distance. I’m guessing the workings of your nervous system would be affected before your tissues were torn apart due to the dimagnetism of water. Lets say I’m flying in a space shuttle or a modern rocket. (yes I know the space shuttle isn’t capable of leaving earth orbit but it could be launched from a space station of some kind.) ---
**Author:** ![Khendrask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3e96dc/32.png) [@Khendrask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Khendrask)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 11:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/8 "2011-10-07T11:46:11Z")
After the spaceship, the second big problem would simply be getting there. It would take a HUGE amount of energy to get there. You can’t just point at it and hit go, you need to shed all of the earths orbital velocity to begin with. ---
**Author:** ![willthekittensurvive](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/91b2a8/32.png) [@willthekittensurvive](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/willthekittensurvive)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/9 "2011-10-07T12:39:45Z")
> [@Khendrask](#): > > After the spaceship, the second big problem would simply be getting there. It would take a HUGE amount of energy to get there. You can’t just point at it and hit go, you need to shed all of the earths orbital velocity to begin with. the way it was explained to me went something like , you are a little bird in a bucket being spun around by a dude, try flying out the bucket straight in to the dude ---
**Author:** ![Arkcon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/96bed5/32.png) [@Arkcon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arkcon)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/10 "2011-10-07T14:52:02Z")
This is a hard question to answer, because our spacecraft never “go directly to” anywhere. We use a number of sling shot maneuvers to tug a reasonably fast moving spacecraft to Mars, or Jupiter for example. So how we get there is a bit of a problem for me to work out. But other people around here may help. The often mentioned trick, “just shoot it into the sun” doesn’t work. Period. I know the sun is big and massive and has a ginormous gravitational pull. But it simply doesn’t work that way. We can start to understand how close we can get to the sun by investigating spacecraft that have gotten close to the sun, and still function. This isn’t as easy to figure out, because when I go to Wikipedia to look for solar observatories … none of them have been particularly close. The sun is so big, staying in the Earth’s orbit, or the Earth-sun Lagrange point, is close enough to observe the sun. MESSENGER is orbiting the planet Mercury, which is kinda close, and its still functional so long as it’s fuel holds out. > **[Sun | Solar space missions](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun#Solar_space_missions)** > > The first satellites designed for long term observation of the Sun from interplanetary space were NASA's Pioneers 6, 7, 8 and 9, which were launched between 1959 and 1968. These probes orbited the Sun at a distance similar to that of Earth, and made the first detailed measurements of the solar wind and the solar magnetic field. Pioneer 9 operated for a particularly long time, transmitting data until May 1983. > In the 1970s, two Helios spacecraft and the Skylab Apollo Telescope Mount provided scie... > **[MESSENGER](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MESSENGER)** > > MESSENGER was a NASA robotic space probe that orbited the planet Mercury between 2011 and 2015, studying Mercury's chemical composition, geology, and magnetic field. The name is a backronym for "Mercury Surface, Space Environment, Geochemistry, and Ranging", and a reference to the messenger god Mercury from Roman mythology. > MESSENGER was launched aboard a Delta II rocket in August 2004. Its path involved a complex series of flybys – the spacecraft flew by Earth once, Venus twice, and Mercury... But I don’t know if someone in a manned vehicle can survive even there. ---
**Author:** ![Mosier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ea924/32.png) [@Mosier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mosier)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/11 "2011-10-07T15:27:43Z")
> [@Alka\_Seltzer](#): > > A black hole won’t do anything to you until you get close enough for tidal forces to become significant (assuming there is no accretion disc around it), at which point you’d be [spagettified](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spagettiffication). Not always. I remember someone (maybe Chronos?) explaining how a particularly massive black hole wouldn’t spaghettify you, and if you considered gravitational forces alone, might be perfectly safe to cross the event horizon. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/12 "2011-10-07T15:36:32Z")
My guess is going to be heat. Radiation will kill you but I think it usually takes a few days even in extreme cases. Gravity generally only kills you when it makes you hit something - traveling towards the sun is essentially like taking a really long fall but not hitting the ground. ---
**Author:** ![Duckster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/duckster/32/1244_2.png) [@Duckster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duckster)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/13 "2011-10-07T15:39:04Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > Your best bet would be to go at night. But it would be easier to see if you went at night during a full moon. ---
**Author:** ![Alka\_Seltzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c89c15/32.png) [@Alka\_Seltzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alka_Seltzer)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/14 "2011-10-07T15:43:16Z")
> [@Mosier](#): > > Not always. I remember someone (maybe Chronos?) explaining how a particularly massive black hole wouldn’t spaghettify you, and if you considered gravitational forces alone, might be perfectly safe to cross the event horizon. Good point. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2011, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/15 "2011-10-08T02:04:10Z")
> [@Mosier](#): > > Not always. I remember someone (maybe Chronos?) explaining how a particularly massive black hole wouldn’t spaghettify you, and if you considered gravitational forces alone, might be perfectly safe to cross the event horizon. But it would have to be really massive - a black hole with the mass of the Sun would spaghettify you. I’m pretty sure you need to get to thousands (or 100s of thousands) of solar masses before the tidal forces are small enough to survive. ---
**Author:** ![BMalion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e274bd/32.png) [@BMalion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BMalion)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2011, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/16 "2011-10-08T02:44:14Z")
> [@Mosier](#): > > Not always. I remember someone (maybe Chronos?) explaining how a particularly massive black hole wouldn’t spaghettify you, and if you considered gravitational forces alone, might be perfectly safe to cross the event horizon. Lemme know how that works out for you. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2011, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/17 "2011-10-08T04:25:03Z")
> [@Alka\_Seltzer](#): > > … > Try to steer clear of [Magnetars](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetar), the magnetic field would be strong enough to wipe your brain at a considerable distance. I’m guessing the workings of your nervous system would be affected before your tissues were torn apart due to the dimagnetism of water. On the other hand, if he were suffering from severe depression triggered by his imminent immolation, it [might help](http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/transcranial-magnetic-stimulation/MY00185). ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2011, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/18 "2011-10-08T04:43:00Z")
Just don’t forget the [Replacement bulb](http://couragede.tripod.com/episodes/smsun09.jpg). ---
**Author:** ![Mosier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ea924/32.png) [@Mosier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mosier)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2011, 9:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/19 "2011-10-08T09:35:29Z")
> [@BMalion](#): > > Lemme know how that works out for you. > > 😛 There’s a decent argument that it might already be working out for me. And you, too! ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2011, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861/20 "2011-10-08T20:52:35Z")
It is in fact possible to pass through the event horizon of a black hole while in perfectly flat space, with no indication whatsoever of the crossing. We might, for all we can tell, have crossed an event horizon 73 seconds ago. It would require what amounts to a cosmic conspiracy against us, though. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flying-to-the-sun/598861.md?page=2)