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Watch video footage of Curiosity’s final descent to Mars

By | August 6, 2012, 8:08 PM PDT

Wonder what it was like to be Curiosity in those final moments of its eight-and-a-half month journey, just as it was about to touch down on Mars?

You can find out through this video, which Mars Curiosity tweeted out Monday night with a message that began, “Look out below!”

The stop-motion video was created from 297 frames shot during the final two-and-a-half minutes before the rover touched down.

Curiosity also tweeted out a photo of itself being gently carried down to the Red Planet via parachute:

And check out the photos of the rover’s first day in Mars. This gallery includes several shots in which the fisheye effect of the camera has been flattened out, giving us a view like what Curiosity actually sees. Plus there’s a spectacular view of Mount Sharp, which Curiosity will climb during its two-year assignment, as well as Curiosity’s first color photos.

And once again, to remind us of how sweet this victory was, let’s take a look at how the NASA control room celebrated when they knew for certain that Curiosity had successfully landed:

Related on SmartPlanet:

via: Mashable

Photo: MarsCuriosity/Twitter

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Laura Shin

About Laura Shin

Laura Shin is a contributing editor for SmartPlanet.

Laura Shin

Laura Shin

Contributing Editor

Laura Shin has written for The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, Audubon and SolveClimate.com. She is currently a senior editor at LearnVest.com. Previously, she worked at Newsweek, the New York Times and Wall Street Journal. She holds degrees from Stanford University and Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism.

Follow her on Twitter.

Laura Shin

Laura Shin

In the unlikely event that Laura has a professional or financial relationship with a company she writes about, it will be prominently disclosed.

She writes for SmartPlanet and is not an employee of CBS.

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