On an October evening in 1992, an 18-year-old New York teenager heard what sounded like a violent crash outside her home. When Michelle Knapp went to investigate, she found that something had pierced the trunk of her parked Chevrolet Malibu and left a small crater in the driveway. Beneath the damaged car was a dark, bowling-ball-sized rock that was still warm. It was not an ordinary stone. It had travelled through space before crashing into her car, and within days, both the meteorite and the battered vehicle had become valuable collector's items. According to NASA , the meteorite was sold for about $69,000, while Michelle Knapp's damaged Chevrolet Malibu was later sold for $10,000. Together, the meteorite and the car brought in roughly $79,000, turning an inexpensive second-hand vehicle into an unusual collector's item.
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The fireball streaks across the night sky
The event took place on October 9, 1992, in Peekskill, New York. Thousands of people across the eastern United States saw a bright, greenish fireball travelling across the evening sky. The event was particularly well documented because people filming high school football games happened to capture the fireball on video from several locations.
According to the American Museum of Natural History , the fireball appeared over Peekskill before the meteorite struck a parked Chevrolet Malibu, punched through the trunk, and dented the driveway below. The stone was still warm when it was recovered and reportedly smelled of sulphur. The detailed record made the event especially unusual. The Meteoritical Bulletin identifies the recovered object as an H6 ordinary chondrite, with a recorded mass of 12.57 kilograms. It fell at about 7:50 pm local time and landed on Knapp's car at 207 Wells Street.
The fireball's journey was reconstructed by researchers using recordings from that night. Research published in Nature analysed 14 video recordings and calculated the meteorite's atmospheric trajectory and original orbit. The study found that the object travelled roughly 700 kilometres across the northeastern United States before the surviving fragment reached Peekskill.
From damaged Chevy to unexpected windfall
Knapp’s Chevrolet Malibu was already quite a bargain. It is said that she purchased the car shortly before the meteorite strike for about $300. The damage also increased the car's value because it became physical proof of the meteorite strike. The meteorite, which had crashed into the car, was found to be an authentic space rock, and soon enough the collectors got interested in acquiring it. Reports put the meteorite's sale price at about $69,000 and the Malibu's at around $10,000.
The car's value was no longer tied only to its age and condition. It was also scientifically valuable because the fall had been witnessed and documented in such detail. Scientists could compare the videos with the actual rock rather than study a meteorite with no recorded fall history. In NASA’s technical literature, Peekskill is described as the first meteorite fall filmed by non-scientists.
A crash preserved in museums
The story of the meteorite was not over after its sale. Parts of the original rock found their way into museums and scientific institutions, providing scientists and visitors the chance to view samples of something that came straight from outer space. The American Museum of Natural History still classifies the Peekskill Meteorite as an H6 meteorite that landed in Westchester County, New York, on October 9, 1992. It is a meteorite that fell from space and struck a Malibu car.
The meteorite was scientifically ordinary, but researchers could still investigate its history long before it hit Earth. Scientific studies of the Peekskill meteoroid included analyses of its cosmic-ray exposure and other properties of the rock itself. For Knapp, the significance was much simpler: a loud noise outside her house and a broken car in the driveway.
The Peekskill fall is unusual because it links the meteorite, the struck car, and the object's atmospheric journey. There are very few cases of meteorites having a recorded history that tells of their origin, impact site, and target. In this case, the target was an old Chevy owned by a teenager.
