Lost Keys Found in Sand .. Newport Beach, CA.
Sunday .. May 3, 2015
It was a nice morning to go play with my metal detector at the beach before too many people get here. After a couple hours I stopped to talk to another detectorist as I was leaving. That’s when Nader walked up to both of us asking if we had found any car keys. I asked him if he had checked with the lifeguards and he had. Then I told him I was a member of TheRingFinders and had a lot of experience finding lost items at the beach. After asking him a few questions, Nader told me that he and his girlfriend had taken a walk on the beach at 2:30am. When they returned to the car he realized his car keys were missing.
I told him it was possible to find them because the area he laid out was not heavily hunted by other detectorist hunt and the beach cleaning machines do not work Sunday mornings. The other guy with a detector wanted to help with the search so we split the search area and began to grid the dry sand. Nader took off to search the pier and the parking lot. I did ask him to leave his phone number so I could contact him. I have had people ask me if I found an item and not been able to locate them after I found it later in the day. I always have my pen and paper with me.
After covering about a football field area of the beach, the keys showed up in my scoop. I called Nader to give him the good news. He was probably three blocks away, but he showed up breathless. I know he was surprised because he knew how far they walked last night. The keys could have been anywhere. It was a shot in the dark but Lady Luck was working in his favor today. Nader said he did not know that TheRingFinders existed, but he would tell all his friend about our group.
Sarah and her husband had spent the day at Laguna Beach. The weather has been awesome, sunny and temperatures in the mid 80’s. They left about 2pm to get on the road before traffic got too bad. Thirty minutes down the road Sarah realiz
ed she did not have her wedding ring set. Two very special rings that she has worn for over 25 years. Her and her husband had recently celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary last week. She knew that she had put the rings in the cup holder of her beach chair while putting on sunscreen. There was a possibility that the rings were in the sand where they had been sitting. Returning to the beach and sifting through the sand with their fingers with no success . Sarah Google searched “how to find a ring in the sand” . Up popped a link to TheRingFinders with my contact information. I was in my car about 8 miles away, but it took about 20 – 25 minutes to get to her location. Just as I pulled up Sarah’s husband found the larger ring. I was able to locate the smaller ring after a few swings of my CTX3030 minelab metal detector. It was a weak signal which may have been because it was in a vertical position. It may have been buried a little deeper because they had been moving around a lot of sand doing their search. What’s most important is Sarah has both of her very special rings back on her finger, hopefully for another 25 years. Sarah commented how her smart phone and the internet worked to bring us together. I agree, I have the metal detecting equipment and know how to use them, but the smart phones and internet makes these recoveries happen.
I received the call at about 3:30pm while detecting at Huntington Beach. It took me awhile to walk a half mile to my car, but I was able to me Alexis and Andrew at 5pm. We talked about the circumstances leading to the loss of the ring. I explained to them how my equipment works. Some people think metal detectors can find things several feet from the coil. Other people do not believe the work for such small items as rings. I knew it was possible to search the long walk back to the parking lot, but the best place to start would be where she picked up her blouse. Sometimes other persons move an item containing the ring or keys not knowing something was hidden inside. I set up an area to grid search about 40’x30′.. Making six passes parallel to the beach with out success, I setup my CTX 3030 to beach mode – all metal and began a cross grid. The next move would have been the long walk back to the parking area. (time consuming and the sun was setting). Three 30 foot passes to and from the water I got a nice 12-02 signal. Calling Alexis over to see the signal and hear the sound, I told her this is your ring and I scooped it. It was a beautiful ring. She dropped to her knees in tears of joy. Andrew also came over to thank me telling me that he had all but given up on ever seeing their ring again. It was a great day and I got another lesson of humility. It is a game of inches and it pays to cross check.