Curiosity Rover Selfie Photobombed By Mars' Mount Sharp

The Curiosity Rover has been roaming the surface of Mars since it landed on the planet in 2012 - sending photos of its travels back to Earth for years. Most recently, the rover took a selfie from Vera Rubin Ridge, an area of the planet where the rover has been exploring for months now.

But when the photo made it back to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory on Earth, researchers noticed something. In the background of the photo, right behind the Curiosity rover’s mast, was Mount Sharp drawing quite a bit of attention. NASA caught the “photobomb” and pointed it out in a post on the Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s website.

Curiosity has been traveling around Vera Rubin Ridge but it will soon make its way to the slope pictured behind it that is clay-rich. The plan is for the rover to climb the slope in the coming weeks to continue exploring. The original plan when the rover landed was to have it study lower Mount Sharp. There, NASA believes the layers that form the mountain base collected in the presence of water on the planet, said the release.

The photo is actually multiple pictures put together to form one image.

The rover also sent back a panoramic photo of Mars from the ridge that shows more than 30 miles or path it traveled to get where it is today.