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Laura Cicco, a Cincinnati woman has filed a lawsuit against NASA as a "proactive" measure to ensure that the space agency does not claim the vial of moondust gifted to her along with a handwritten note by Neil Armstrong.
Armstrong was a friend of Laura’s father back in the 1970s. According to an NY Post report, Cicco claimed that she was gifted a small vial of moondust along with a handwritten note from Armstrong when she was 10 years old.
Decades later, she rediscovered the vial of pale grey dust in her parent’s belongings. In an attempt to ensure the prized gift remains in her possession, she has filed the lawsuit in Federal Court. NASA has not made any attempt to retrieve the vial from Cicco, nor has there been any confirmation by the space agency whether it plans to do it.
In an earlier incident, a lunar sample bag used by Armstrong during the Apollo 17 mission was mislabelled by a government employee which ultimately led to the bag being auctioned to the public. On realising the error, NASA tried to reclaim the lunar artefact. However, the court decided against the American space agency and said that government was not the rightful owner of the bag and allowed the private owner to keep it.
Scientists have analysed the vial in possession of Cicco twice and believe that the dust is likely from moon. However, they are not ruling out the possibility that it might be of terrestrial origin. It will be interesting to see how NASA responds to the lawsuit and if it decides to attempt getting possession of the lunar sample.
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