A Whitfield pensioner is carrying out his late wife's wish for her ashes to be sent into space.

Audrey Bates, 75, who died in March last year, was fascinated by space travel and before she died she made her husband Geoff promise to send her ashes to the moon.

And although 81-year-old Geoff, who lives in Nursery Lane, has not been able to achieve that, he has managed the next best thing by paying for her remains to be launched into space from New Mexico in the USA today.

Mr Bates said: "Audrey would have been delighted to have this final trip.

"She was utterly fascinated by space travel."

He said that Dover funeral director Paul Sullivan had made all the arrangements with the American space burial company Celestis.

It charges £466 for the service.