NASA released a "postcard" image from its Curiosity Mars rover on Sept. 16, 2026, marking the mission's 5,000th Martian day, or sol. According to the agency, the spacecraft used its black-and-white navigation cameras to capture panoramas at two times of day, the first on Aug. 30, 2026, at 9:56 a.m. local Mars time, and the second on Sep. 2, 2026, at 5:39 p.m. local Mars time. Those dates correspond to sols 5,000 and 5,003, NASA said.

The two images were merged after transmission to Earth, with color added as an artistic interpretation: blue for the morning panorama and yellow for the afternoon one. The photo was taken while Curiosity was parked at a sand ridge nicknamed "Chocolatal."

The rover's deck appears in the foreground, including its can-shaped UHF antenna and its finned Multi-Mission Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator (MMRTG), a nuclear power source. Curiosity is in the lower foothills of Mount Sharp, a 3-mile-tall (5-kilometer-tall) mountain within Gale Crater. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory built Curiosity and leads the mission.