Pakistan on Thursday announced that it will send its first astronaut to space in 2022 using ally China's satellite launching facilities. Pakistan's decision came as India on Monday successfully launched its second lunar mission Chandrayaan-2. Fawad Chaudhry, Minister for Science and Technology, said the selection process of the astronaut for the space mission would start from February 2020.

NASA carried-out a successful test Tuesday of a launch-abort system for the Orion-capsule designed to take US-astronauts to the Moon. The three-minute exercise at Cape-Canaveral in Florida aimed to test in almost real-life conditions the evacuation of astronauts from the capsule in the event of an explosion or rocket-booster failure. A return of US-astronauts to the Moon is expected in 2024 at the earliest.

A commemorative plaque brought to the moon on the Apollo 11 mission went under the hammer for USD 468,500 in Texas, as part of a huge collection that once belonged to late astronaut Neil Armstrong, auctioneers said. The plaque includes a representation of the lunar module that touched down on the moon on July 20, 1969.