The Ring Finders
Metal Detecting Service Inc.

I received a call from Lindsay whose wife had lost her diamond ring in Perth’s Swan River, quite close to the old Claremont jetty. Lindsay wanted to hire my services to see if I could locate this ring.

The ring was lost overboard in about 5 feet of water when it became entangled in a fishing net.

The ring holds great sentimental value (not to mention dollar value) as the original diamond came from another older ring and was set into a new 18k white gold setting. As you can imagine, both of them are desperate to try and recover the ring.

The search area was probably about 1000 square metres and I knew it was going to be a difficult hunt as the area was littered with large iron objects, buried beneath a few inches of mud sediment.

I prepared myself as best as I could with 2 detectors, 2 scoops and quite a few floating markers to define the search area as accurately as possible.

The number and size of iron objects in the water was a major problem as their audio signals were drowning out any smaller ring sized ones. I could see broken boat moorings with long lengths of chain and heavy steel cables which were laying around like broken spaghetti.

I’m not one to give up easily but deep down I knew that a metal detector was going to be overwhelmed in these conditions. Earlier, Lindsay and a friend had tried looking for the ring by snorkeling and hopefully spotting it this way. The fine sediment and seaweed was also another problem. This had turned into my most difficult hunt ever !

I spent several hours trying to pinpoint a small ring sized object amongst this graveyard of iron debris….I’m sure this area must have been the scene of fierce naval battle at some stage.

I finally made the decision to abandon this hunt, which I really hate doing as I don’t like to give up but the word “impossible” was what this was becoming.

I let Lindsay know of my results. He’s a great guy and thanked me for my efforts.

If I can think of an alternative way to find this ring then I’ll be back for sure.

Thanks for reading,

Tony.