Mars Rover Curiosity Celebrates First Anniversary With A Selfie

Selfies are a hot trend these days. It looks like as if everyone who has a smartphone with a front-facing camera is in on this, everyone from your average joe and jane to celebrities and politicians. We now welcome something entirely different in the mix. Mars rover Curiosity has completed its first Martian year and as part of the celebrations NASA has released a “selfie” that the rover took of itself on the Red Planet.

In case you don’t know a Mars year isn’t the same as an Earth year. It has already been over one year since the Rover was sent up to Mars, but on June 24th, it completed its first Martian year, a year that is equal to 687 Earth days.

You can’t help but feel respect for the rover that has been up there all alone for nearly two years. It isn’t bowing out anytime soon even, Curiosity will continue to explore the Red Planet and may provide vital information that will aid ambitions of sending a man on Mars.

The image NASA released today is actually one that patches together countless images taken through the camera attached at the end of Curiosity’s arm, the camera is called the Mars Hand Lens Imager.

The site where the rover is seen in this image is called Windjana. Here Curiosity takes a look at layers of sandstone that have been exposed by levels of wind erosion. NASA provides perspective for this image, reminding us that Curiosity’s wheels are 20 inches in diameter and that it has traveled over five miles on the planet amid towering dunes and intensely rocky surface.

Adnan Farooqui
Categories: Robots
Tags: curiosity