Watching the stream you could literally see the anxiety in their faces. In fact, the flight engineers sent their last commands when the craft was about 21,000 km (13,000 miles) from the landing site, which was a little over an hour from touchdown. From that point, the entire entry, descent and landing sequence was entirely automated. So even if something went awry, they wouldn't have been able to do anything about it.
First colour image looking north towards the crater rim from the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI), which is still in its stowed position with the dust cover on, so it is still quite blurry: Full resolution black and white image from the front hazcam showing Mount Sharp: It seems I was wrong about there being no entry footage from the rover itself. This is a stop-motion video of thumbnails taken from the assembly during the final stages of descent and landing:
It's interesting that even after seeing that much dust billowing around, the immediate surface around the rover looks relatively undisturbed. The particles that were kicked up must have been much finer, leaving the rocky pebbles on the ground.
That's great that they promote an interest in science. When I was in primary school, the only thing they would show us was the Melbourne Cup, but we all know what was just for the teachers trying to win their way out of there.
