A kennel struck by a meteorite has been sold at an auction for over £30,000.
The dilapidated dog house that survived a hit from outer space was expected to fetch up to £220,000 at a Christie's auction.
The online-only sale of 66 lots ended on Wednesday included "meteorites containing the oldest matter humankind can touch," Christie's said in a statement.
The kennel's resident Roky, a German Shepherd, was inside and narrowly escaped when a meteorite crashed through the tin roof in April 2019 in Aguas Zarcas, Costa Rica.
"A seven-inch hole marks where the meteorite punctured the roof," Christie's said in the treasure's description.
The kennel eventually sold for $44,100 at auction, with one item - listed as a "slice of the moon" - selling for $189,000.
Roky the German Shepherd had a narrow escape when a meteorite crashed through the tin roof of his kennel in April 2019
Christie's
A meteor-struck cow in Venezuela in 1972 was not as fortunate as Roky.
Its remains were butchered by a farmer and eaten.
So far, humans have been spared. And, while fiery crashing meteorites may be terrifying, they actually are commodities in an industry known as the meteorite trade, according to astrophysicist Neil DeGrasse Tyson.
"You might go your whole life without ever touching a meteorite, but there are people who have devoted their entire careers to finding them in the wild, and they often go up for sale either to merchants or at an auction," Tyson said.
This "slice of the moon" sold for $189,000
Christie's
"So, if you want a piece of the universe other than Earth, they're available to you."
Tyson sees no shortage of those precious prizes from outer space now or in the near future.
"There's probably many more tons of Moon meteorites and Mars meteorites scattered on Earth than are currently in our collections," Tyson said.
"In a way, the universe is coming to us."