Sometime around 1977, John Moore of Truro, Massachusetts came back from a long beach drive and parked his beloved white Jeep Wagoneer in the garage.

This past Friday—February 24th, 2017—the Jeep finally came out again. As an excavator yanked it from under the sand, it emerged in crumpled pieces, its once-white exterior coated with rust.

As the property’s current owner, John Musnuff, explained to the Cape Cod Times, Moore stopped taking his Wagoneer out after he began having trouble with the fuel line. Soon enough, nature took over. Sand began blowing into and over the car, and a whole dune eventually collapsed on top of the shed. For decades, “the Jeep sat entombed in the garage,” the Times writes.

But this year, the town decided to let the sand have its way. On Friday, workers hired by the Conservation Commission dragged out the mangled body of the Wagoneer, to make space for the dune to continue to move across the beach. Musnuff popped off the car’s hubcaps, for memory’s sake, and watched as it was trucked off to spend the rest of its life, presumably, in a more appropriate landfill.

Every day, we track down a fleeting wonder—something amazing that’s only happening right now. Have a tip for us? Tell us about it! Send your temporary miracles to cara@atlasobscura.com.