"Moon Rock" found fake!

The Dutch national museum said that one of its treasures, a rock that is apparently brought back from the moon by US astronauts is actually, in fact, just petrified wood worth about $90 USD.

The Rijiksmuseum's spokeswoman Xandra van Gelder who also took part in proving that the "moon rock" was a fake said that the museum would keep it anyway, just for curiosity and for a laugh.

"It's a good story, with some questions that are still unanswered," she said. "We can laugh about it."

The museum acquired the rock after the death of Willem Dreesman in 1988, a former prime minister.

Dreesman received it as a present on the 9th of October, 1969 from the US ambassador J. William Middendorf at a visit by the three Apollo Astronauts.

When it was on an exhibition in 2006, a space expert commented that it was rather unlikely for NASA to give away any souvenirs from the moon after a mere three months from the space mission.