Curiosity has landed!
Widespread scepticism about the 'bizarre landing technique' was dismissed when the Curiosity rover touched down successfully in Gale crater on Mars. The landing site is a truely exciting place for the rover to explore, the crater being some 90 miles in diameter with a massive central peak. I think we can anticipate some spectacular 'poster' images from Curiosity as the exploration progresses. As the rover's instruments are commissioned, the flow of images from the Martian surface has steadily increased. The image accompanying this post is of the descent capsule's heat shield just after it was ejected during the descent. The shield is about 4.5 m in diameter, and the image was acquired when it was about 16 m away from the rover. See also images below. Further images from Mars, as they are received can be found on the NASA website: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/msl/index.html
Widespread scepticism about the 'bizarre landing technique' was dismissed when the Curiosity rover touched down successfully in Gale crater on Mars. The landing site is a truely exciting place for the rover to explore, the crater being some 90 miles in diameter with a massive central peak. I think we can anticipate some spectacular 'poster' images from Curiosity as the exploration progresses. As the rover's instruments are commissioned, the flow of images from the Martian surface has steadily increased. The image accompanying this post is of the descent capsule's heat shield just after it was ejected during the descent. The shield is about 4.5 m in diameter, and the image was acquired when it was about 16 m away from the rover. See also images below. Further images from Mars, as they are received can be found on the NASA website: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/msl/index.html
The parachute phase of the descent of Curiosity was captured by the Mars Reconnaisance Orbiter spacecraft from Mars orbit.
One of the early B&W images showing the mountain ridge of the distant Gale crater wall.
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