Curiosity marks 5,000 sols on Mars with a postcard from Mount Sharp
NASA’s Curiosity rover marked its 5,000th Martian day with a postcard from a sand ridge nicknamed Chocolatal. Its navigation cameras captured black-and-white panoramas on August 30 and September 2, 2026, at 9:56 a.m. and 5:39 p.m. local Mars time. The two views were merged and coloured blue for morning and yellow for afternoon. The rover’s deck, UHF antenna and nuclear power source appear in the foreground, with tracks stretching into the distance. Curiosity is in the lower foothills of Mount Sharp, the five-kilometre mountain inside Gale Crater; the crater rim is barely visible on the horizon.
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The postcard turns two observations into one scene. Its blue and yellow also tell you which parts came from morning and afternoon.
Those colours are an artistic choice, rather than a literal colour photograph of Mars. The underlying navigation-camera panoramas were black and white.