NASA Curiosity live coverage now on

[Octane (Humayun)]

Ken,

I was the one holding my iPhone with a whole bunch of people around me -- my hands were shaking even though my arms were rested on a table!

H

[mithrandir (Andrew)]

Originally Posted by Nico13

I drive the guys at work crazy with Astronomy but they all gathered around to see this bit of wizardry.
First class effort to all involved.

Originally Posted by Octane

I was the one holding my iPhone with a whole bunch of people around me -- my hands were shaking even though my arms were rested on a table!

What a great day for it to be Bank Holiday!

[danielsun]

Originally Posted by rthorntn

Apologies if somebody has already posted this but this animation shows the complexity of what just happened:

http://video.nationalgeographic.com/...ity-rover-vin/

Mind blowing!

Thanks Richard, that is incredible and shows just how complex and precise this mission is and had to be. Amazing stuff!!

[gary]

Originally Posted by danielsun

> Originally Posted by rthorntn
> Apologies if somebody has already posted this but this animation shows the complexity of what just happened:

> http://video.nationalgeographic.com/...ity-rover-vin/

Mind blowing!

Thanks Richard, that is incredible and shows just how complex and precise this mission is and had to be. Amazing stuff!!

It was very well publicized, including here on IceInSpace before, but in
case anyone managed to miss it, this 5:00 video entitled "7 Minutes"
(aka "7 Minutes of Terror") has high production quality, narratives provided by
some of the engineers involved and dramatic music to boot -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ki_Af_o9Q9s

And sometimes people ask me, "What do engineers actually do?".

[iceman (Mike)]

Check this out - photo of Curiosity during descent, taken from the HiRISE orbiter!

http://www.uahirise.org/releases/msl-descent.php

[Omaroo (Chris Malikoff)]

Originally Posted by iceman

Check this out - photo of Curiosity during descent, taken from the HiRISE orbiter!

http://www.uahirise.org/releases/msl-descent.php

Mazing

[Tamtarn]

Watched it live. Absolutely amazing! Can't wait to see more images from Curiosity coming through.
Barb

[ZeroID (Brent)]

Got home just in time to watch the celebrations on the tablet. ( I love no boot up time !! ) although I heard the landin announcement on the car radio. Absolutely awesome to see the first pix back in such a short time frame, bodes well for the long term exploration. I wonder what we'll learn now ?
Congratulations to all at NASA on this one. Deserves one of them Gold Medal thingies ...

[Screwdriverone (Chris)]

I may as well chip in,

[strongmanmike (Michael)]

Originally Posted by iceman

Check this out - photo of Curiosity during descent, taken from the HiRISE orbiter!

http://www.uahirise.org/releases/msl-descent.php

Man!! how cool is that??? ...what an age we are enjoying huh?

Mike

[Screwdriverone (Chris)]

Here is another one.

[strongmanmike (Michael)]

Originally Posted by iceman

Check this out - photo of Curiosity during descent, taken from the HiRISE orbiter!

http://www.uahirise.org/releases/msl-descent.php

That would have to be the first time a spacecraft has been directly imaged while landing on another solar system body, wouldn't it...?

[Octane (Humayun)]

Also, today's XKCD:

http://xkcd.com/1091/

H

[DavidU (Dave)]

Lol !

Originally Posted by octane

also, today's xkcd:

http://xkcd.com/1091/

h

[gary]

Originally Posted by iceman

Check this out - photo of Curiosity during descent, taken from the HiRISE orbiter!

http://www.uahirise.org/releases/msl-descent.php

Wow! That's amazing! I see on the same page there is an update with an
image that is believed to be of the heatshield in free-fall.

Back of the envelope calculation ...

MRO altitude approx 283km
Curiosity altitude 1 min prior to touchdown approx 1.6km
Parachute diameter 15.5m

So from MRO's perspective, the deployed parachute would appear about 11 arc seconds across.

But when you consider it is resolving the dot at the center of the parachute, which
judging from images of the chute when it was being tested on Earth, might be, say,
1m across, that would be in the order of 1 arc second from the perspective of
MRO.

[strongmanmike (Michael)]

Originally Posted by strongmanmike

That would have to be the first time a spacecraft has been directly imaged while landing on another solar system body, wouldn't it...?

Seems not

http://www.scientificamerican.com/sl...3086FFDD888605

Mike

[Suzy]

Both those pics are so funny Chris- aaaah what a crack-up!!!
haha Curiosity killed the cat gives that term real meaning now.
You should have shared it on fb.

[Mountain_Wanderer]

Awesome that the rover landed successfully

[JB80 (Jarrod)]

This is a nice stop motion video of the descent.

http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/video...a_id=149974611

[SkyViking (Rolf)]

I'm so excited, have been looking forward to this day for the last 5 years or so. Of course watched the whole thing live and what an amazing and flawless landing it was! Can't wait to see the images and science coming out of this during the next months and years.