Want to see your tax dollars at work? Nothing says it better than the breath-taking oblique angle photograph of the Phoenix lander, it's parachute, and its parachute lines descending into (actually past) the "Heimdall" crater!
A satellite we launched 42 million (give or take a few million) miles to orbit the planet takes a photograph of the entrance of another spacecraft we send to check for samples.
Your viewing the first ever photograph of a spacecraft landing on another world taken by a camera not attached to it.
This is history. Now Phoenix... find us some water, and some life!
EDIT: Changed post title. Yeah, I totally copied the title of Bad Astronomy blog's post. Sorry. It REALLY wasn't intentional.
MESSENGER has returned quite a few high quality Mercury photographs. Check these out; the surface details are of the side of Mercury the Mariner 10 missions did not photograph!
The cratered surface of Mercury has not been visited in about 30 years. Only 45% of the surface of Mercury has been imaged by the Mariner 10. MESSENGER has a full suite of scientific instruments and will be able to tell us many things about the geological history, and hopefully about the highly reflective material (possibly water-ice in the perpetual shadows) of the north and south poles, of Mercury as well as image the remaining portion of the planet unseen by the previous Mariner mission.
The official MESSENGER website has a slew of great, entertaining, and interactive information pertaining to Mercury. Check it out for some fast facts, great animations, and even an interactive quiz or two to test your Mercurian knowledge.
MESSENGER is now at its closest point (about 124 mi) from the surface of Mercury. Now... we wait for the pics!
Tomorrow, the first flyby of Mercury will occur. As you can see, we are quickly approaching the closest planet to the Sun.
