Hypnotising video from space shows lightning strikes and city lights as the Earth spins

Beautiful video shared by a Nasa astronaut has shown the spectacular views enjoyed by those orbiting the Earth of events down here on the ground.

"Spectacle of lightning strikes followed by alluring city lights and fishing boats around the Sea of Japan in this #timelapse taken from our favorite window on the International Space Station," Randy Bresnik posted on Facebook.

The 50-year-old space walker, who is commander of the International Space Station (ISS), regularly shares pictures and videos from the station on his Facebook account.

Wednesday's video-share prompted questions and comments from fascinated earthlings everywhere.

"If I could see this in person just once, I could die feeling complete. How beautiful," Moriah Thomas wrote.

Others had scientific questions ranging from the cause of the orange curved lines above the Earth visible in the video to what some of the twinkling lights in the footage might have been.

The footage of the earth curving past the camera might be magnificent to some but would surely cause controversy at the Flat Earth Society.

The society recently gained viral fame for a Twitter conversation with billionaire entrepreneur and SpaceX founder, Elon Musk.