Every day, the Daily Dot finds something that people on Facebook are sharing and, in turn, shares it with you—with a little explanation. Here’s today’s share.
For some, the Mars Rover landing was the dawn of a new day.
Many Facebook users are sharing a photo of a stark Martian landscape with a tiny point of a sun in the distance, captioned “Beautiful sunrise….on Mars.” And people definitely see the beauty.
“this is so beautiful,” wrote Fauzi Ame.
“Oh how beautiful it is..left untouched and should stay that way,” Zara De Groot added.
Although the landscape is indeed beautiful and untouched (save NASA’s presence), it isn’t from the Curiosity Rover, which just landed on the Red Planet Monday. The photo was taken by the Spirit rover in 2005, a year after it landed. Sadly, the Spirit isn’t with us anymore—it got stuck in 2009. NASA lost communications with it in March 2010, and has since given up on trying.
Another point: This is a sunset, not a sunrise, and that’s an important distinction. According to NASA, who published this photo seven years ago:
“The long Martian twilight (compared to Earth’s) is caused by sunlight scattered around to the night side of the planet by abundant high altitude dust.”
“Sunset and twilight images are occasionally acquired by the science team to determine how high into the atmosphere the Martian dust extends, and to look for dust or ice clouds.”
Hence why the landscape seems so dusty. Of course, some Facebook users are more cynical.
“THAT didn’t take long for them to polute the sky,” Rick Smith wrote.
Photo via True Activist’s Page/Facebook
