Skip to main content

Mars Curiosity rover snaps dreamy images of drifting Martian clouds

 

NASA’s Perseverance rover may be grabbing all the headlines just now, but the space agency’s other active rover, Curiosity, continues to explore the red planet after arriving there almost a decade ago.

Recommended Videos

Like Perseverance, Curiosity’s initial mission length was set at two years, but NASA later decided to extend it indefinitely. Since then, the rover has stayed busy, investigating various Martian mysteries, examining rocks, climbing slopes, and even snapping selfies.

Its latest treat for space fans came a few days ago when it beamed back some incredible images of Martian clouds.

Bobak Ferdowsi, who works at the California-based Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) that’s overseeing both the Curiosity and Perseverance rover missions, shared some of the images on Twitter.

“I cannot get over these Martian cloud photos from MarsCuriosity this week,” Ferdowsi wrote. “Can you imagine watching clouds drift by on Mars?”

I cannot get over these Martian cloud photos from @MarsCuriosity this week. Can you imagine watching clouds drift by on Mars?
📷: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS pic.twitter.com/p5QoSlPgHI

— Bobak Ferdowsi (@tweetsoutloud) March 6, 2021

The thin, wispy clouds on Mars confirm the existence of water in the red planet’s atmosphere, though scientists say it’s at a level around 1/1000th of Earth’s, and no rain ever falls.

The idea that Mars experiences weather systems surprises many people. It goes beyond just clouds, too, as evidenced by this extraordinary image of a dust devil occurring on the planet, captured by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter as it passed overhead around 180 miles up.

Our Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter often catches nature in action. Here, its HiRISE camera captures a whirlwind, often called a dust devil, traversing dunes. Details: https://t.co/j4qfFTMUkF pic.twitter.com/OZTdcoNbf0

— NASA Mars (@NASAMars) March 6, 2021

You may be interested to know that there’s even an account on Twitter offering updates on Mars’ weather that pulls its data from special instruments on the Curiosity rover and NASA’s InSight lander. Curiosity takes daily weather measurements from its location in Gale Crater in the southern hemisphere of Mars, near the planet’s equator.

Sol 3048 (2021-03-03), high -14C/7F, low -73C/-99F, pressure at 8.30 hPa, daylight 06:35-18:31 pic.twitter.com/NgADN9pHCN

— Mars Weather (@MarsWxReport) March 6, 2021

Also, Mars, like Earth, has four seasons, with white caps of water ice and carbon dioxide ice shrinking and growing through summer and winter at the poles.

“Evidence of climatic cycles exists, as water ice is formed in layers with dust between them,” the National Weather Service says on its website. “In addition, features near the south pole may have been produced by glaciers which are no longer present.”

It adds: “In general, Mars has highly variable weather and is often cloudy.  The planet swings from being warm and dusty to cloudy and cold.  Mars long ago was likely a warmer, wetter planet with a thicker atmosphere, able to sustain oceans or seas.”

Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
Celebrating a white Christmas — martian style
Frosty scene at the south pole of Mars

As many people gear up for the festive period, they might be hoping for a white Christmas in their local area. but Along those lines, the European Space Agency (ESA) is showing its festive spirit with an image of a white Christmas on Mars.

This cozy image was taken by ESA's Mars Express, a spacecraft orbiting the planet that has a high-definition camera on board that takes photos of the planet's surface. The image was captured by Mars Express’ High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) in the Australe Scopuli region in Mars' southern hemisphere in June 2022, but has only just been released as a festive celebration.

Read more
NASA orbiter captures one last image of retired InSight lander on Mars
This illustration shows NASA's InSight spacecraft with its instruments deployed on the Martian surface.

NASA's Insight lander spent four years on the surface of Mars, uncovering secrets of the planet's interior, but it eventually succumbed to the most martian of environmental threats: dust. Mars has periodic dust storms that can whip up into huge global events, lifting dust up into the air and then dumping it on everything in sight -- including solar panels. After years of accumulation, eventually the dust was so thick that Insight's solar panels could no longer generate enough power to keep it operational, and the mission officially came to an end in December 2022.

That wasn't quite the end of the story for InSight, though, as it is still being used for science to this day, albeit indirectly. Recently, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) caught a glimpse of InSight from orbit, capturing the lander's dusty surroundings and showing how even more dust had built up on it.

Read more
NASA’s Mars rover just emerged from Jezero Crater. So, what next?
Perseverance's view from the rim of Mars' Jezero Crater

NASA personnel are celebrating the news that its Perseverance rover has finally reached the top of the Mars’ Jezero Crater rim after a challenging climb that took three-and-a-half months to complete.

The six-wheeled rover ascended 1,640 feet (500 meters) and made stops along the way to conduct various science observations as it continues its search for signs of ancient microbial life on the red planet.

Read more