ISS astronaut reveals Ukraine war carnage can be seen from SPACE including rockets and burning cities

, a translation of his comments reads: "When you're in space, you feel so far away at first.

"At the beginning of the war, the whole country went dark at night.";

He continued: "People actually only recognized Kyiv.

"Then you could also see the impacts in the first days of the war. In Kyiv, you could see lightning at night."

He also mentioned viewing "rockets that hit".

Maurer made his comments after returning to Earth from a mission called "Cosmic Kiss".

He'd been on the ISS since November 2021 so was there when Russia invaded Ukraine earlier this year.

Mauer and his colleagues didn't need to use any special equipment to see the war from space.

He said it "was clearly visible to the naked eye from space".

Adding that there were clearly "huge clouds of smoke over cities like Mariupol."

Despite being in space, the birdseye view made Mauer feel closer to the war.

He said: "War seen from above is a hundred times more irrational than from the ground. Why don't we humans stick together?"

Satellites have also been able to capture the destruction in Ukraine and continue to monitor the war.