H6 Peekskill, New York

On Friday, October 9, 1992 a blazing fragmenting intruder from outer space tore across the evening sky of northeastern United States. Video cameras trained on Friday-night high-school football games turned skyward to capture the rocketing fireball before it drilled through a 1980 Chevy Malibu parked in a driveway in Peekskill, NY — just miles outside of New York City. Few meteorite falls have been caught on film and none have been captured from as many different cities and angles as Peekskill. Additionally, there are few collisions between meteorites and cars on record, and this is by far the most famous and this is the only meteorite with such a dual pedigree. Millions of years before smashing into the Malibu, the parent asteroid of the Peekskill meteorite experienced its own significant collision. As a result of impacts on its parent asteroid, it was crushed and experienced extensive melting prior to being ejected into an eventful encounter on Earth.

Specimens of the Peekskill meteorite are difficult to obtain. A portion of the meteorite from which this slice was removed, along with the car it hit, have been on an international museum tour for years. Just prior to the impact, the car was purchased for $400. Shortly thereafter it sold for $10,000 and it is today worth in excess of an order-of-magnitude more. Peekskill’s signature heather-hued matrix is with mottled caramel accents and transected by an intricate webbing of shock melt — evidence of a violent impact on its parent asteroid. Metal flakes, further evidence of the same, are dispersed throughout. Softly triangular, there are two cut edges and one long curve of fusion crust on this sample of what is among the most famous meteorites in the world.

Christie's would like to thank Dr. Alan E. Rubin at the Department of Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, University of California, Los Angeles for his assistance in preparing this catalogue.


62 x 61 x 2mm (2.5 x 2.5 x 0.1 in.) and 23.89g