Pyongyang from above: ISS camera glimpses inside North Korea (PHOTOS)
New satellite images captured by a high-tech camera on the International Space Station (ISS) offer a rare insight into life on the ground in North Korea’s capital, Pyongyang.
The ultra-high-definition camera by Canadian company UrtheCast was installed on the station in 2014, and constantly records highly-detailed images of Earth as the ISS orbits above.
Video footage of Pyongyang reveals very little visible activity for a city with a population of over 3.2 million people. Fewer than two dozen cars are seen moving around the downtown area and very few people are visible.
A number of the city’s landmarks, including its Arch of Triumph, Kim Il-sung Stadium, and the Chinese Embassy, can be clearly seen.
The Kumsusan Palace of the Sun, which houses the bodies of the founder of North Korea Kim Il-sung and his son and successor, Kim Jong-il, was also filmed.
Given that the ISS is traveling about 400 kilometers (250 miles) overhead at about 27,600 km/h (17,150 mph), the resulting high-def images can be blurry and somewhat distorted, so ‘corrective’ software has been used to clear up the camera’s focus.
The footage of North Korea was captured on May 30 and recently released by UrtheCast in a blog.
As part of its ‘Earth Viewing Experiment,’ the ISS constantly streams footage of Earth from a series of cameras attached to the station. It recently captured dramatic images of Hurricane Matthew as the category 3 storm hurtled towards Cuba.
Hurricane Matthew: Satellite images show ‘monstrous’ storm bound for US (PHOTOS, VIDEOS) https://t.co/TDzeiWzZyj pic.twitter.com/W0Tp0vhOx7
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- Source : RT
