Ride along with Curiosity as it descends to the surface of Mars in this 4 fps video taken by the rover’s Mars Descent Imager (MARDI) camera! These images are low-resolution, the full-res versions will be available at a later date. But still the view during the rover’s harrowing descent, showing the heat shield falling away and eventually the surface rising up with dust blowing around, is an amazing and wonderful thing to watch — especially that we now know that Curiosity is performing perfectly!

This mission just never ceases to amaze…

Video: NASA/JPL-Caltech

UPDATE: Here’s a version by Dominic Muller that uses hi-res images, has been smoothed out digitally and played at 25 fps along to a lovely piece of music. Because some people know how to do that. Enjoy: