NewsTracker Answers for week of Oct. 15, 2018

Q: A Russian cosmonaut and a U.S. astronaut were safe after a Soyuz rocket bound for the International Space Station failed in mid-air two minutes after liftoff, leading to a dramatic emergency landing in Kazakhstan. Where is the Central Asian nation of Kazakstan?

Circle the area on this map

Q: The rocket failure triggered the emergency ejection of the crew capsule which landed a couple hundred miles from the Baikonur spaceport. The space launch facility in Kazakhstan is the world’s ...

A. Newest

B. Oldest

B. The Baikonur Cosmodrome is the world's first and largest operational spaceport. Both the first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1, and the first man in space, Yuri Gagarin, were launched from Baikonur. The facility was built by the old Soviet Union in the 1950s and is now leased to Russia by Kazakhstan’s government.

Q: Kazakhstan was the last of the Soviet Republics to declare independence during the breakup of the Russian-dominated Soviet Union in 1991. Which of Kazakhstan’s neighbors was NOT part of the Soviet Union?

A. China

B. Kyrgyzstan

C. Turkmenistan

D. Uzbekistan

A. While Soviet leaders backed the Communists who won China’s civil war in 1949, China remained independent, and the two nations became rivals and even fought each other in 1969 over a border dispute.

Q: Soviet officials originally chose Kazakhstan’s Baikonur as a launch site to test its intercontinental ballistic missiles because of its remote location ...

A. In the mountains

B. On the ocean

C. In the forest

D. On the steppe

D. Kazakhstan is in the heart of the Great Steppe, vast area of grassland that stretches from Romania and Moldova through Ukraine, Russia, Kazakhstan, Xinjiang, and Mongolia to Manchuria. A steppe is characterized by grassland plains without trees apart from those near rivers and lakes. The prairie of North America is an example of a steppe.

Q: Kazakhstan’s language and identity go back to the Kazakh Khanate, a remnant of the Mongol Empire that once ruled most of Asia and part of Europe. It was the second-largest empire in history. What was the largest empire?

A. British

B. Japanese

C. Roman

D. Russian

A. At its height in 1920, the British Empire controlled 23.84% of the world’s land area. The Mongols ruled 16.11% of the land in the 13th century, while the Russians controlled 15.31% in 1895, including what is now Kazakhstan.