Logan and Samantha had been swimming in the lagoon at midnight after a work conference at The Fairmont Orchid Hawaii on the Big Island, Hawaii. They, along with friends and colleagues, had been having fun in the water after a work wrap-up party.
Sam realized her wedding band had slipped off her finger into the dark water. But she quickly realized she’d lost not just one but two rings! Her engagement ring must have come off first – but she had no idea where that had been lost – in the water, on the shore – where?!? Her wedding band now also seemed lost in the dark forever.
We got “the call” the next morning and arrived at the small bay an hour before noon to search for the lost rings. Sam looked distraught and Logan looked really unhappy at the situation of his unhappy wife!
We started looking right away, with Sylvie searching the shallows with her Garrett Sea Hunter and me going a little deeper in the water with my Minelab Excalibur II.
The Fairmont Hotel has little water movement so our biggest concern to recovering the ring was that fact that it was so late in the afternoon already – maybe the beach had been searched earlier that morning and the rings had been found by treasure hunters!
After an hour of carefully detecting back-and-forth I suddenly hit a strong signal. There had been no other solid signals until then, deepening our fears that the area had already been detected. I scooped the signal in the water – nothing – then scooped again. A diamond-encrusted wedding band was in the scoop! Logan ran over and while happy for the find, was now concerned to find the second, more valuable engagement ring. We continued to search – going over and over the area we thought it was in.
Sylvie expanded the search area and signaled that she’d found something under the sand. Her detector does not discriminate between metal objects like mine does, so she dug in the sand (under about 2 feet of water with her long-handled scoop), not sure if she’d be pulling out a bottle cap or a ring.
Sylvie looked into the basket of her scoop and grabbed something and held it high for Logan and Sam to see who were down the beach. The entire beach – even the beach bar – all started clapping! Sylvie held a large, gleaming two-carat engagement ring in her fingers. The beachgoers must have been watching the long hunt and the applause was great, but seeing Sam reunited with her treasures – and Logan’s praise and relief were worth a million!
Sylvie always says that we’re in the Business of Saving Marriages This time it really was our own ‘married teamwork’ that saved the day with one ring-recovery each!
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These gold and platinum rings were found and returned in the water by Big Island Metal Detecting. A whopping $30,000 was the combined cost of these beautiful treasures!
Below are just a few pictures of my latest recoveries.
