Mars Rover Landing Photos

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NASA's Curiosity rover and its parachute were
spotted by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter as
Curiosity descended to the surface on Aug. 5 PDT
(Aug. 6 EDT). The High-Resolution Imaging Science
Experiment (HiRISE) camera captured this image of
Curiosity--the rover and its parachute are in the
center of the white box.
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The green diamond shows approximately where
NASA's Curiosity rover landed on Mars, a region
about 2 kilometers northeast of its target in the
center of the estimated landing region (blue
ellipse).
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This is one of the first images taken by NASA's
Curiosity rover, which landed on Mars the evening
of Aug. 5 PDT (morning of Aug. 6 EDT). It was
taken through a "fisheye" wide-angle lens on the
left "eye" of a stereo pair of Hazard-Avoidance
cameras on the left-rear side of the rover.
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In this black and white photo released by NASA's
JPL-Caltech, This is the first image taken by
NASA's Curiosity rover, which landed on Mars the
evening of Aug. 5 a.m. PDT. It was taken through
a "fisheye" wide-angle lens on one of the rover's
front left Hazard-Avoidance cameras at
one-quarter of full resolution. The clear dust
cover on the camera is still on in this view, and
dust can be seen around its edge.
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A spectator watches a live stream of the Mars
Curiosity landing while listening to an audio
broadcast on her phone among the hundreds of
other on-lookers in Times Square, August 6, 2012,
in New York. After traveling 8 1/2 months and 352
million miles, Curiosity landed on Mars Sunday
night.
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Steve Collins waits during the "Seven Minutes of
Terror" as the rover approaches the surface of
mars, inside the Spaceflight Operations Facility
for NASA's Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity
rover at Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena,
California, The Curiosity robot is equipped with
a nuclear-powered lab capable of vaporizing rocks
and ingesting soil, measuring habitability, and
potentially paving the way for human exploration.
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NASA Administrator Charles Bolden smiles as the
rover begins its decent to the surface of mars,
inside the Spaceflight Operations Facility for
NASA's Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity rover at
Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.
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This photo released by NASA shows the view from
the balcony of the control rooms at the Jet
Propulsion Laboratory, the Dark Room in the
foreground, Deep Space Network control room on
the right, and the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL)
Mission Support Area, back left, in Pasadena,
Calif. The MSL Rover named Curiosity is designed
to assess whether Mars ever had an environment
able to support small life forms called microbes.
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In this photo released by NASA's JPL, Members
Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) team work in the
MSL Mission Support Area at the Jet Propulsion
Laboratory hours ahead of the planned landing of
the Curiosity rover on Mars, Sunday, Aug. 5, 2012
in Pasadena, Calif.
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Shannon Lampton, and Charlene Pittman, both
educators with the U.S. Space and Rocket Center,
cheer as they watch NASA's Mars Curiosity rover
land on Mars during a special viewing event at
the U.S. Space and Rocket Center Monday, Aug. 6,
2012 in Huntsville, Ala.
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In a photo provided by NASA, the Mars Science
Laboratory team in the MSL Mission Support Area
reacts after learning the the Curiosity rover has
landed safely on Mars and images start coming in
at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory on Mars, Sunday,
Aug. 5, 2012 in Pasadena, Calif.
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Alex Trebek in the picture
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Lennon Batchelor, 27, of Orlando, center, pauses
while watching a live stream of the Mars
Curiosity landing while neighboring spectators
cheer in Times Square after the successful
touch-down, August 6, 2012, in New York. After
traveling 8 1/2 months and 352 million miles,
Curiosity landed on Mars Sunday night.
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Mars Science Laboratory Flight Director Keith
Comeaux, left, talks to his team inside the
Spaceflight Operations Facility for NASA's Mars
Science Laboratory Curiosity rover at Jet
Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif.
on Sunday, Aug. 5, 2012.
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Activity lead Bobak Ferdowsi, who cuts his hair
differently for each mission, works inside the
Spaceflight Operations Facility for NASA's Mars
Science Laboratory Curiosity rover at Jet
Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif.
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In this photo provided by NASA, the Mars Science
Laboratory (MSL) team welcomes White House
Science and Technology Advisor John Holdren,
third standing from left, as he stops by to meet
the landing team and to say "Go Curiosity" as
NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, second from
left, and Jet Propulsion Laboratory Director
Charles Elachi, far left look on, Sunday, Aug. 5,
2012 at JPL in Pasadena, Calif.
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In this photo released by NASA, an empty jar
marked "Days Until Entry" and a jar full of
marbles marked "Days Since Launch" sit on a
conference room table during a meeting of the
Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) team at the Jet
Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. The
MSL team has been moving one marble a day since
launch from jar to jar.
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This artist's rendering released by
NASA/JPL-Caltech on Sunday, Aug. 5, 2012, shows
how NASA's Curiosity rover will communicate with
Earth during landing. As the rover descends to
the surface of Mars, it will send out two
different types of data basic radio-frequency
tones that go directly to Earth (pink dots) and
more complex UHF radio data (blue circles) that
require relaying by orbiters
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NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) director
Charles Elachi presents a can of "good luck"
peanuts during an overview of the status and
plans for NASA's Science Mission Directorate at
JPL in Pasadena, Calif., Sunday, Aug. 5, 2012.
After traveling 8 1/2 months and 352 million
miles, Curiosity will attempt a landing on Mars
Sunday night.
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In this file photo taken Adam Steltzner, Mars
Science Laboratory's entry, descent and landing
phase leader at JPL uses a scale model to
explains the Curiosity rover's Entry, Descent,
and Landing (EDL) during the Mission Engineering
Overview news briefing at NASA's Jet Propulsion
Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.
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This Aug. 2, 2012 file photo shows Nick Lam, data
controller, monitoring the Mars rover Curiosity
from the Deep Space Network's control room at
NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena,
Calif. NASA's Curiosity rover is zooming toward
Mars. With about a day to go until a landing
attempt, the space agency says the
nuclear-powered rover appears on course.
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(From L) John Grunsfeld, NASA associate
administrator, Richard Cook, MSL deputy project
manager, Pete Theisinger, MSL project manager,
Adam Steltzner, MSL entry, descent and landing
(EDL) lead and John Grotzinger, MSL project
scientist from the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL)
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A visitor takes a photo of a sign reading 'Rover
Xing' at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in
Pasadena, California August 2, 2012 ahead of the
landing of the Mars rover Curiosity
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Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission members
work in the data processing room beside Mission
Control at Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in
Pasadena, California August 2, 2012 ahead of the
landing of the Mars rover Curiosity.
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Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity members from
left Richard Cook, MSL deputy project manager,
Adam Steltzner, MSL entry, descent and landing
(EDL) lead and John Grotzinger, MSL project
scientist, California Institute of Technology,
from the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) Curiosity
Rover mission team celebrate the landing of
Curiosity rover on the surface of Mars at NASA's
Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.,
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The target landing area for NASA's Mars Science
Laboratory mission was the ellipse marked on this
image of Gale Crater. The ellipse is about 12
miles long and 4 miles wide (20 kilometers by 7
kilometers).
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A June 2012 revision of the landing target area
for Curiosity, the big rover of NASA's Mars
Science Laboratory mission, reduced the area's
size. It also put the center of the landing area
closer to Mount Sharp, which bears geological
layers that are the mission's prime destination.
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This set of images compares test images taken by
four cameras on NASA's Curiosity rover at NASA's
Jet Propulsion Laboratory before launch.
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This image shows the topography, with shading
added, around the area where NASA's Curiosity
rover is slated to land. Red indicates higher
areas and purple indicates lower areas, with a
total elevation range of about 600 feet (nearly
200 meters). The red oval indicates the targeted
landing area for the rover known as the "landing
ellipse
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This is a close-up view of the northern
two-thirds of one of the quadrangles (number 50)
that were mapped onto the landing region of
NASA's Curiosity rover. Note the presence of
layered deposits around the rim of an impact
crater, as well as along a scarp that traces
through the center of the quad. These exposures
are reminiscent of the terrain studied by NASA's
Opportunity rover, where exploration was limited
to the layered deposits exposed along the flanks
of craters.
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This image shows engineers predictions of where
NASA's Curiosity rover would enter the atmosphere
of Mars on Aug. 5 PDT (Aug. 6 EDT). The
background image is a false-color image from the
Thermal Emission Imaging System (THEMIS) camera
on NASA's Mars Odyssey spacecraft.
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Painting demo by members of the International
Association of Astronomical Artists. Four artists
are working on this image of Curiosity on Mars
with the point of view being from the Gale
Crater. The painting will be presented to Bill
Nye. The two men in the photos are artists Aldo
Spadoni (left) and Jon Ramer (right) of IAAA.
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We had a big party at Riff Raff Studio in Silver
Lake in Los Angeles. There were red lights
fittingly bathing the party in a Martian glow.
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by Meredith Bennett-Smithwww.huffingtonpost.com