The Peekskill Meteorite Car

The Peekskill Meteorite Car is the red 1980 Chevrolet Malibu struck by the Peekskill meteorite on October 9, 1992.[1] Known simply as 'Peekskill' in scientific parlance, the meteorite is among the most famous falls on record: a record sixteen separate video recordings document its fall through the Earth’s atmosphere, whereupon it struck the parked Malibu in Peekskill, New York, at approximately 7:50 pm EDT.

Impact

After having been slowed by the Earth's atmosphere, the meteorite was traveling at approximately 164 miles per hour (264 km/h) at impact. Peekskill smashed through the Malibu’s trunk and narrowly missed the gas tank, finally coming to rest in an impact pit beneath the car. Eighteen-year-old Michelle Knapp, the car’s owner, heard the collision from inside her home. She later described the sound as “like a three-car crash”. Hurrying outside to investigate the noise, Knapp found her car smashed and the meteorite weighing 26 pounds (12 kg), still warm and smelling of sulfur, beneath it.[2]

Knapp had just purchased the car for $300. Immediately following the extraterrestrial impact, it was sold to Iris Lang, wife of renowned meteorite collector and dealer Al Lang, for $10,000.[3] Since then, it has been on display in numerous museums throughout the world, including New York City’s American Museum of Natural History and France’s National Museum of Natural History.[4]

The red Malibu, the most renowned object clipped by a meteorite,[5] is now owned by the Macovich Collection in New York City, as is the largest remaining specimen of the Peekskill meteorite.[6]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Langheinrich, R.A. "The Peekskill Meteorite Car".
  2. ↑ Norton, O. Richard (1994). Rocks From Space. Missoula, Montana: Mountain Press Publishing Company.
  3. ↑ Norton, O. Richard. Rocks from Space.
  4. ↑ "Meteorite People". Meteorite Times Magazine.
  5. ↑ "Peekskill Meteorite: Top 10 Meteorites". Discovery.
  6. ↑ "The Macovich Collection".