New Interactive Panorama Shows Curiosity's View from the Dingo Gap Sand Dune

By Nancy Atkinson - February 05, 2014 05:30 PM UTC | Planetary Science

Mars Panorama - Curiosity rover: Martian solar day 530

in

world

"Red Rover, Red Rover, I'm looking right over... this sand dune on Mars," said the

Curiosity rover on Twitter

, as well as quoting photographer Ansel Adams, "There are always two people in every picture: the photographer and the viewer."

This new interactive image put together by panoramacist Andrew Bodrov using the latest imagery from Curiosity allows you to nearly join the rover on Mars as it looks down across a sand dune and into the "Dingo Gap" area and the valley beyond.

The rover team is considering driving across and through this meter high sand sand dune to reach their desired science destinations instead of going over terrain with sharp rocks which might poke more holes in the rover's aluminum wheels.

You can read more about this region and see more panoramas and 3-D views

in our most recent article by Ken Kremer

.

Thanks to Andrew Bodrov for sharing this new interactive image, which were taken with the rover's 34-millimeter Mast Camera. The mosaic, which stretches about 30,000 pixels width, includes 101 images taken on Sol 530 (Feb 1, 2014 here on Earth.)

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson is a space journalist and author with a passion for telling the stories of people involved in space exploration and astronomy. She is currently retired from daily writing, but worked at Universe Today for 20 years as a writer and editor. She also contributed articles to The Planetary Society, Ad Astra (National Space Society), New Scientist and many other online outlets.

Her 2019 book, "Eight Years to the Moon: The History of the Apollo Missions,” shares the untold stories of engineers and scientists who worked behind the scenes to make the Apollo program so successful, despite the daunting odds against it. Her first book “Incredible Stories From Space: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Missions Changing Our View of the Cosmos” (2016) tells the stories of 37 scientists and engineers that work on several current NASA robotic missions to explore the solar system and beyond.

Nancy is also a NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador, and through this program, she has the opportunity to share her passion of space and astronomy with children and adults through presentations and programs. Nancy's personal website is nancyatkinson.com