This stop-motion video shows 297 frames from the Mars Descent Imager aboard NASA's Curiosity rover as it descended to the surface of Mars. These thumbnail images were received on Earth on Aug. 6, 2012, and cover the last two and a half minutes of descent.
For many of us who watched in awe as Apollo 11 delivered the first men to the moon in 1969, it was common to believe that in another 10 years, 20 at the most, there would be boot prints in the Martian dust to match those in the Sea of Tranquility. The safe landing of Curiosity on Mars isn't quite what we had in mind. But the engineering prowess that went into building and putting that machine down in Gale Crater was nonetheless marvelous to behold.
Below is the first color photo taken by the Curiosity rover on the surface of Mars. As you can see, it's a bit fuzzy. That's because the lens cover has Martian dust on it. Those covers can be opened and closed. This picture of the landing site puts the color view in the context of a computer simulation derived from images acquired from orbiting spacecraft. The view looks north, showing a distant ridge that is the north wall and rim of Gale Crater.
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