Lost Ring Next To Highway .. Laguna Hills, CA .. Found and Returned

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I reeived a call Sunday afternoon from Melissa she had a unusual situation where a family heirloom ring may have been lost on the side of a toll road. She generally explained to me that her husband’s brother had lost a gold ring that had belonged to his deceased father. It had happened a couple weeks ago, possibly on the side of the Orange County 73 toll road. Her question was, would I be willing to try searching the area?

We agreed to meet Monday with her brother in law, Josh. He took,a few minutes to tell me the what happen the evening of the loss before we drove onto the toll road. Two weeks before he had pulled to the side of the highway where he suffered a seizure. He was able to get out of his car, confused and disorientated, Josh remembered walking alongside the guard rail a couple blocks toward the next exit. He said, he had fallen a couple times. The next thing he remembered was was struggling with ambulance attendants as he had another attack. Later at the hospital is where Josh realized the ring was missing.

It is always a long shot when a person doesn’t feel the ring come off and so many possibilities of where the could have come off. I agreed to give it a try, at least to eliminate the area. I wasn’t quite sure how to legally proceed with the search. Pedestrians are not permitted on this particular toll road. When they searched the area they had called the highway patrol to get permission to search. The highway patrol sent a patrol car to ok the search location. 

It was too cold and windy Monday and I needed at least two hours to cover the large area. Tuesday after traffic slowed down I was able to park safely off the side of the road. 

Walking up to where Josh had parked his car, I started my grid search on the safe side of the guard rail. It was a 3 foot wide dirt path with marble size rocks. One side had asphalt and the other side was thick brush. I wanted to eliminate this 100 yards first but in my mind the best possibility would be where the struggle with the abundance personnel happened.

There was a lot of tin foil and pieces of aluminum trash, but 50 yards from the start of my search I got a pull tab or gold signal. Looking down I spotted the unique gold ring lying in the hard packed dirt amongst the rocks.

It was amazing, considering all the places that it could have been lost. I was also concerned that the highway patrol would not give a second permission to search because of liability laws.

I was able to send a photo of the ring to Melissa, who was totally responsible for making this happen. She talked me into giving a try, saying it was their last chance. Two hours later I met Melissa’s husband, Justin to return the ring.

He told me how his dad had worn this ring for as long as he could remember and that it meant so much to the whole family.

This was not an easy search but worth every minute of preparation and I’m so glad I didn’t refuse to try something that seemed impossible. I can’t get tired of seeing miracles.