The biggest piece of lunar rock ever auctioned

A Boston auction house offers what it says is the largest piece of lunar rock ever auctioned, a rare lunar meteorite found in northwestern Africa.

The meteorite is made up of six pieces that fit together perfectly, weighing a total of about 5 kilograms, and are estimated to sell for $ 500,000 on October 18th, RR Auction reported.

"It's one of the largest lunar meteorites ever found," said Geoff Notkin, general manager of Aerolite Meteorites, the company selling the specimen, in an interview. "And there's never been one like that and it's called a lunar puzzle."

Although the pieces look a lot like regular brownish black earth rocks for an untrained eye, Notkin said it was a thing of rare beauty for a hobbyist. meteorites such as himself.

The rock was found in Mauritania but was probably dipped on Earth thousands of years ago.

AAP

Some pieces of lunar rock came back to Earth under the supervision of Apollo astronauts. Meteorites, usually hundreds or thousands of years ago, propelled the rest of the moon's surface to the surface of the moon.

Most likely to disappear in the world's oceans, but a few hundred confirmed examples of lunar meteorites have been discovered in recent decades on the mainland, many in Antarctica or in the deserts of northwestern Africa.

In 2012, Heritage Auctions offered what she then called the largest piece of lunar rock ever auctioned, weighing about 1.8 kilograms.

Even the largest fragment of the Aerolite specimen, known as Northwest Africa 11789, appears to be larger and weighs more than 4 kg (2 kg), according to its entry in the Meteoritical Society's Meteoritical Society database. nonprofit based in Virginia.

The database indicates that the meteorite is composed of nine pieces, not six.

"I'm pretty sure it was a mistake," said Dustin Dickens, the meteorite trader who had submitted the entry after buying the specimen last year in Mauritania to a hunter. of meteorites, said that he wished to remain anonymous after finding coins in Mali, neighboring country.

He thinks it was seven pieces, but said that he had given the smallest piece, weighing a few tens of grams, to the Institute of Meteoritics of the University of New Mexico for testing purposes.

Notkin and RR Auction did not immediately answer questions about the gap.

In 2007, one of the largest lunar meteorites ever discovered was discovered in Morocco, a single mass weighing 11 kg.