Balanced rock on Mars
Readers!
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Cool image time! Prior to going into safe mode Curiosity’s mast camera took a series of images of its surroundings, as is routine as the rover travels. Among those images was the image above, though I have cropped it and reduced its resolution to show here. It reveals a balanced rock on the horizon. It also shows, as do the other survey images, how increasingly rough the terrain is becoming that Curiosity is traveling through.
The Curiosity science team has no intention of getting too close to this rough terrain, but they do hope to get better views of this rock as they continue the rover’s journey uphill.
My annual birthday-month fund-raising drive for Behind the Black is now on-going. Not only do your donations help pay my bills, they give me the freedom to speak honestly about science and culture, instead of being forced to write it as others demand.
Please consider donating by giving either a one-time contribution or a regular subscription, as outlined in the tip jar below.
Regular readers can support Behind The Black with a contribution via paypal:
If Paypal doesn't work for you, you can support Behind The Black directly by sending your donation by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman, to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
Cool image time! Prior to going into safe mode Curiosity’s mast camera took a series of images of its surroundings, as is routine as the rover travels. Among those images was the image above, though I have cropped it and reduced its resolution to show here. It reveals a balanced rock on the horizon. It also shows, as do the other survey images, how increasingly rough the terrain is becoming that Curiosity is traveling through.
The Curiosity science team has no intention of getting too close to this rough terrain, but they do hope to get better views of this rock as they continue the rover’s journey uphill.
They certainly need to have a better look at that thing. Is it maybe some kind of illusion? Its shape and place are unreasonable, and it is darker than most of its surroundings. Something is wrong with this picture and cameras don’t always tell the truth at first sight. Maybe a dust devil is involved.