First Hong Kong astronaut to join Shenzhou XXIII space mission

Zhang Jingbo, a spokesman for the China Manned Space Agency, said at a news conference on Saturday morning at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwestern China that the three astronauts — mission commander and spaceflight engineer Colonel Zhu Yangzhu, spacecraft pilot Colonel Zhang Zhiyuan, and science payload specialist Lai Ka-ying — will travel aboard the Shenzhou XXIII spacecraft to the Chinese space station, which is orbiting Earth at an altitude of about 400 kilometers.