“The ring is gone forever.”
That’s what most people assume.
After 38 years of metal detecting, I’ve learned that “lost forever” is seldom true.
Tracy posted on Facebook asking for someone with a metal detector, and the community pointed her my way. Her husband Jason had been swimming at Coopers Beach and returned to shore without his wedding ring.
Not just any ring – it had been made from the melted-down wedding rings of Tracy’s late father and grandfather. Completely irreplaceable.
We met at the 5:30am low tide next day. Jason showed me where he entered the water and the buoy he’d swum out to. The search area was huge. Recent inwards sand movement let me wade a long way out, so I focused on clearing the bulk of the area before further sand movement.
Hours passed. My pouch filled with fishing sinkers and wisps of foil from long-corroded beer cans. 47 targets dug, no ring.
Jason thanked me for trying – but I wasn’t finished.
I returned for the evening tide. Two more hours. Still nothing.
Day 2: Jason organised some SCUBA mates. While they searched near the buoy, I extended my search lines. More junk. By now I’d cleared the water out to 1.6m deep (nostril depth!) — it was becoming a dive job.
The next day, after a quick 5-minute ring recovery nearby, nothing special to warrant a writeup, I closed off the final wading area for Jason – in my normal clothes as I didn’t have my togs with me. Two more hours confirmed it, the ring was in SCUBA territory.
Conditions were perfect this morning. Jason provided kayak cover while I laid search lines on the seabed. This is when experience matters – the buoy chain alignment showed the buoy had shifted about 90° since the ring was lost. With ±10m of chain on the bottom and sustained northerlies immediately prior to when Jason had his swim, the target area was now focused to the south of the buoy.
I adjusted the pattern and worked the southern arc, a very large eagle ray cruised out of the murk, curious, then pivoted 180° and disappeared again.
Then, a low “double-thud” in the headphones. I know this sound well!
I fanned the sand away, and sitting in the bottom of the resulting depression about 10cm under the sand, yellow gold flashed in the sunlight.
Doing my best Arthurian legend “Lady of the Lake” moment, I surfaced holding the ring up at arms length in front of Jason. His reaction said it all, however, I can’t repeat the actual words here!
I still had ‘housework’ to do down below, bringing in the lines and the ring stayed clipped to a carabiner until we were safely ashore.
Back at the beach, the relief when Jason slid it back on his finger was immense.
Moments like this never get old.
And my near-perfect hit rate continues.
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