The light peak is Mt. Sharp — an eventual destination of the Curiosity rover. … Curiosity’s is already on the move crossing the intermediate gravel field toward an interesting terrain feature named Glenelg. Curiosity has also already started analyzing its surroundings by zapping a nearby rock with its laser to analyze the chemical composition of […]
[FOR HIGH RESOLUTION, CLICK ON IMAGE BELOW] You’ve just landed on Mars and opened your eyes — what do you see? If you’re the Curiosity rover, you see a strange gravelly place with a large mountain in the distance. You’ve landed on target near the edge of 150-km wide Gale Crater, with Mount Sharp on […]
[CLICK ON IMAGE FOR HIGH RESOLUTION] Just as it captured the Phoenix lander parachuting to Mars in 2008, the HiRise camera onboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) snapped this picture of the Curiosity rover’s spectacular descent toward its landing site on August 5 (PDT). The nearly 16 meter (51 foot) wide parachute and its payload […]
PASADENA, Calif. — About 34 hours from the Mars rover Curiosity’s landing (scheduled for 01:31 am Eastern time on Monday), NASA brought us the latest weather forecast from the surface — dry and cold, with a slight chance of dust. Slight is good. Earlier this week, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spotted a dust storm south […]