WAPAKONETA, Ohio (AP) — Ohio police say a rare gold replica of the lunar space module has been stolen from the Armstrong Air and Space Museum.
Police in Wapakoneta (wah-puh-kuh-NEHT’-uh), in northwest Ohio, responded to an alarm at the museum just before midnight Friday and discovered the 5-inch high, solid-gold replica had been stolen.
Replicas of the lunar excursion module produced by Cartier were presented to Neil Armstrong and his two fellow astronauts, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins, in Paris shortly their historic space mission. Armstrong, a Wapakoneta native, became the first person to step onto the moon’s surface in July 1969.
The FBI and the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation are assisting Wapakoneta police in an investigation of the theft.
Armstrong died in 2012 at the age of 82.