Austin Gebert, was installing Christmas decorations in the front lawn of his McHenry, Illinois home when he lost his gold wedding ring. Nearly a foot of snow covered the ground. At one point, as Austin flipped snow off his cold bare hand, he felt the ring fly off. He told me on the phone, “It left my hand like a bullet.” The ring just vanished into the whiteness.
Austin reached out to me by phone on Sunday evening, December 7th. I arranged the hour-long drive the next morning and was greeted by Gabriela, Austin’s wife. She gave me a tour of the suspected lawn area. I noted several metallic Christmas decorations in the vicinity. These needed to be removed so as not to interfere with a metal-detection search.
An initial search failed to turn up Austin’s ring. I moved to a larger snow pile alongside the Gebert’s driveway where it had been shoveled. About 14 inches into the pile, I heard a faint signal in my headset. My trusty pin-pointer helped locate the target. Reaching in with my bare fingers I felt an unmistakable ring-like object and pulled it up and out into the light of day. Sure enough, it was Austin’s ring! 
Since Austin was at work, I presented the ring to Gabriela whose face lit up like Christmas lights. Her smile tells the rest of the story.
Thank you, Austin, for the privilege of searching for and finding your missing wedding ring!
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