NASA has published a video shot from the International Space Station of the huge storm, Hurricane Irene, as it approaches New York. Hurricane Irene will become the first hurricane in three years to make landfall in the United States and is currently a category two storm on the Saffir-Simpson hurricane wind scale.
The crew watching the progress of the storm aboard the ISS have been making adjustments to their mission following the failed launch of a resupply craft. The rocket, launched from Kazakhstan on Wednesday 24th August, experienced a problem during the third stage of its sequence and automatically shut down the engine, landing in the the Altai Region of Russia. It is the first time that a supply vehicle has failed to reach the ISS, though the ISS crew are reported to have plenty of supplies on board to maintain them.
The Russian Space Agency has launched 745 Soyuz-U launch vehicles to date. There have been 21 launch failures and 724 successes. A commission has been set up by the agency to find the cause of the failure and weigh any potential impact upon future missions.
In This Story: Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country mainly located in Central Asia with a smaller portion west of the Ural River in Eastern Europe.
Kazakhstan is the world’s largest landlocked country. It has a population of 18.3 million residents, and has one of the lowest population densities in the world. Since 1997, the capital is Nur-Sultan, formerly known as Astana. It was moved from Almaty, the country’s largest city.
Kazakhstan was the last of the Soviet republics to declare independence during the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Kazakhstan is the most dominant nation of Central Asia economically, generating 60% of the region’s GDP, primarily through its oil and gas industry. It also has vast mineral resources. Kazakhstan is a member of the United Nations (UN), WTO, CIS, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), the Eurasian Economic Union, CSTO, OSCE, OIC, CCTS, and TURKSOY.
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is an independent agency of the U.S. Federal Government responsible for the civilian space program, as well as aeronautics and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeeding the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics.
Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country located in Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east, and from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea in the south.
Russia spans more than one-eighth of the Earth’s inhabited land area, stretching eleven time zones, and bordering 16 sovereign nations. Moscow is the country’s capital.
The Soviet Union was dissolved in 1991 and since 1993 Russia been governed as a federal semi-presidential republic. Russia is a major great power, with the world’s second-most powerful military, and the fourth-highest military expenditure. As a recognised nuclear-weapon state, the country possesses the world’s largest stockpile of nuclear weapons.
The United States is a country also known as the United States of America, USA, US or just America. There are fifty states in the union, which is a federal republic ruled by a representative democracy. Nearly ten million square kilometres are inhabited by over 300 million people. The majority of Americans speak English.
