Astronaut captures massive blizzard from space

Houston: American astronaut Scott Kelly has captured images of the massive storm affecting a quarter of the US' population from the International Space Station.

One of his photos shows the large storm system covering much of the East Coast with dull city lights illuminating just underneath the thick cloud cover.

In another photo, Kelly, 51, pointed out that the huge system moving from Chicago toward the east "clearly has a long way to go".

NASA's Suomi NPP satellite also documented the storm system, which stretched from New England to Florida.

Much of the storm has moved toward the Northeast and brought blizzard conditions to cities such as Washington DC and New York, killing 18 people and affecting 85 million others.

Kelly is known for sharing stunning views from space. The astronaut is spending 342 days on the International Space Station. It is the longest stretch of time any US astronaut has spent in space, CNN reported.

NASA is testing how long-duration space flights impact the human body for future travel to Mars and other deep space missions, it said.