Of the 270 Apollo 11 Moon rocks and the Apollo 17 Moon rocks that were given to the nations of the world by the Nixon Administration, approximately 180 are unaccounted for. Many of these rocks that are accounted for have been locked away in storage for decades. The location of the rocks has been tracked by researchers and hobbyists because of their rarity and the difficulty of obtaining more.
Investigations In 1998, a unique federal law enforcement undercover operation was created to identify and arrest individuals selling counterfeit Moon rocks. This sting operation was known as Operation Lunar Eclipse. Originally two undercover agents were involved in this sting, Senior Special Agent Joseph Gutheinz of NASA's Office of Inspector General (NASA OIG), posing as Tony Coriasso, and Inspector Bob Cregger of the United States Postal Inspection Service, posing as John Marta. This sting operation was later expanded to include agents from the United States Customs Service, namely, Special Agent Dwight Weikel and Special Agent Dave Atwood. The sting operation was led by NASA OIG Senior Special Agent Joseph Gutheinz. The sting operation recovered an Apollo era Moon rock, the Honduras Goodwill Moon Rock. This Moon rock had been given to Honduras by President Nixon, fallen into private hands, and then offered to the Agents for $5 million. In order to recover this Moon rock, the agents had to come up with the $5 million requested by the seller. Billionaire and one-time presidential candidate H. Ross Perot was asked by one of the agents to put up the money, and did so. After leaving NASA for a teaching position at the University of Phoenix, in Arizona, Gutheinz challenged his criminal justice graduate students to locate the goodwill Moon rocks. He subsequently extended this project to also cover the missing Apollo 11 Moon rocks President Nixon gave to the states and nations of the world in 1969. Hundreds of graduate students have participated in this project from 2002 to the present and while many Moon rocks have been found, others are now known to be missing, stolen, or destroyed. Gutheinz patterned this college project after NASA's earlier Operation Lunar Eclipse, which he had participated in. Beginning in 2002, his graduate students began reporting to him that both the Cyprus Apollo 11 Moon rock (which is actually a collection of lunar dust in a Lucite ball) and Cyprus Apollo 17 Goodwill Moon Rock (a pebble-size Moon rock) were missing. Operation Lunar Eclipse and the Moon Rock Project were the subject of the 2012 book The Case of the Missing Moon Rocks by Joe Kloc.
Missing gifted rocks
United States
Delaware
The Apollo 11 display was stolen in 1976.
New Jersey
An Apollo 11 sample is on display in the New Jersey State Museum. Experts and politicians in New Jersey, including former Governor Brendan Byrne, are unaware where the Apollo 17 sample was, or if the state even received it.
International
Brazil
The Apollo 11 display is missing.
Canada
The Apollo 11 display is missing.
Cyprus
While the Apollo 17 Goodwill Moon rock presented to Cyprus was recovered, the Apollo 11 rock given to the country remains missing. In his June 26, 2011 Op/Ed appearing in the Cyprus Mail entitled "Houston we have a problem: we didn't give Cyprus its moon rock", Joseph Gutheinz revealed that after NASA recovered the Cyprus Apollo 17 Goodwill Moon Rock over a year ago they failed to give the Moon rock to its legal owner, the nation of Cyprus.
Honduras
The Apollo 11 display is missing. The Apollo 17 display was stolen and later recovered.
Ireland
The Apollo 11 rock presented to Ireland was accidentally discarded in a landfill known as the Dunsink Landfill in October 1977 following a fire that consumed the Meridian room library at the Dublin Dunsink Observatory where the rock was displayed. Cleo Luff, a student from the University of Phoenix, obtained this information after her investigation into the Moon rock's location for a class she had with Professor Joseph Gutheinz. The Apollo 17 Goodwill Rock remains with the National Museum of Ireland.
Malta
On May 18, 2004, Malta's Goodwill Moon Rock was stolen from Malta's Museum of Natural History in Mdina. According to an Associated Press story appearing in USA Today, "there are no surveillance cameras and no custodians at the Museum of Natural History because of insufficient funding. The only attendant is the ticket-seller"... "A Maltese flag displayed next to the rock — which the U.S. astronauts had taken up with them — was not taken". Joseph Gutheinz, a retired NASA Office of Inspector General Special Agent who heads up a "Moon Rock Project" at the University of Phoenix (where he assigns his students the task of hunting down missing Moon rocks), urged the Maltese authorities to grant an amnesty period to the thieves. He advised that only an amateur thief would have taken the Maltese Goodwill Moon Rock and left the plaque and flag behind, as all three together would have been self-authenticating and eliminated the risk of a geologist needing to authenticate the Moon rock. Malta's Goodwill Moon Rock has not been recovered and continues to be actively pursued.
Nicaragua
The Apollo 11 display was stolen and later recovered. The Apollo 17 display is missing.
Romania
University of Phoenix graduate students uncovered evidence that the Romania Goodwill Moon Rock may have been auctioned off by the estate of its executed former leader Nicolae Ceaușescu. Both Nicolae Ceaușescu and his wife, Elena Ceaușescu, were executed by firing squad on December 25, 1989, for the crime of genocide. As late as 2009, Romania believed it only received one Moon rock from the Nixon Administration, the Apollo 11 Moon rock, and took issue with those who argued otherwise. Joseph Gutheinz provided Daniel Ionascu of the Jurnalul information from the U.S. National Archives which showed that the Romanian Goodwill Moon Rock was presented to Romania. Romania's Apollo 11 Moon Rock is at the National History Museum in Bucharest.
Spain
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