China's Mars spacecraft shows off in spectacular selfie shots
China has upped the game for space selfies by releasing a camera from its Mars orbiter.
The China National Space Administration sure knows how to do selfies right. In 2021, we got an adorable view of the Zhurong rover and Tianwen-1 lander down on Mars. Now we have some dazzling shots of the Tianwen-1 spacecraft orbiting the red planet.
The space agency released a set of images on Saturday, including what it described as "the first full photo of the mission orbiter." The orbiter released a camera that looked back and captured the spacecraft with Mars in the background. The planet's icy north pole region is in the view.
The Tianwen-1 mission has several components, including the lander, rover and orbiter. The lander touched down in May 2021 and the rover has been exploring Utopia Planitia, a wide plain in Mars' northern hemisphere.
The Tianwen-1 orbiter shines in this close-up selfie taken by a camera released from the spacecraft.
We previously had seen a portrait of the Tianwen-1 spacecraft while it was on its way to Mars in 2020. It seems the new full-orbiter selfie was taken using the same method via the release of a camera that snaps pictures and sends the data back to the spacecraft to then send home to Earth.
The China National Space Administration shared two other orbital images, including a closer look at the shiny spacecraft and a view of the planet's north polar ice cap, which looks like swirls of white over a dusty red landscape.
Tianwen-1 has been a success for China, and the rover and orbiter continue to collect and relay data back to Earth. The spacecraft selfies give us an unusual view of a mission in progress and highlight how the exploration of Mars has become an international effort.
h/t to Andrew Jones on Twitter.