: A Beachside Miracle: Recovering Chris’s Lost Wedding Ring at Oxnard Shores



Dave & Maureen were enjoying a mini vacation on the beach of Emerald Isle, NC. Dave placed his wedding band in his hat while he was swimming in the ocean. When he returned, he put the hat on and the ring flew into the sand. The newlywed couple searched for 15 minutes but got rained out by a thunderstorm. Maureen texted me later that night and asked if I could search for the ring the following day or 2. After learning the ring was very close to a public beach access, I was concerned another person would find Dave’s ring. Even though it was getting late, they agreed to meet me as soon as I could arrive and begin the search. Dave & Maureen remembered the area very well and this lead to my quickest recovery yet as my first signal was his ring and using a headlamp, part of the ring was visible in the sand at night. I think I took 8-10 steps before finding his beautiful wedding band. It was very pleasing watching Maureen & Dave celebrate the recovery!



Chris sent me an email asking if I could help him. He lost his wedding band the night before while at rugby practice. I did a quick Google map search of the field, and it looked pretty barren. So I decided to walk the field before work. When I get there, the field was a solid grass carpet about 5 inches tall. It’s not going to be found by a quick walk.
There was a guy on the field with a human-powered push mower. I asked if his name was Chris. He looked at me with a concerned look, as I was in my work uniform, which makes me look like a police officer. He said yes, and I told him that he sent me a message that he lost a ring. There was relief on his face. He showed me the areas that he was in during practice, pretty much the whole field.
I told him that I wouldn’t get there until the weekend because of work and another recovery that I have today after work. He told me that his wife didn’t know he was at the practice, and he didn’t tell her that his ring was lost. They just celebrated their 4th anniversary a few days earlier.
I went to the beach that night to search for the other ring; I need to get into the water at low tide. There was a thunderstorm when I arrived and when the storm passed the ocean was angry. Large, powerful waves were kicking my butt. I couldn’t complete the search, so I will have to return.
I called Chris and told him that I would be at the field in an hour and 15 minutes if he wanted to meet me there. He said he couldn’t, that his inlaws were over, and he didn’t tell anyone that his ring was lost. He left the room when he saw that I was calling to answer the phone. I told him that I would spend about an hour there tonight, but it could be a several-day search because it is such a large field.
I knew where he placed his bag & drink. So I started there. No luck. So I started at 1 corner of the field and decided to search length-wise. I figured 1 down and back would take about an hour. There are a lot of targets. A lot of “can slaw”, cans that have been cut up by a lawnmower, leaving many aluminum pieces.
I got about ¾ of the way down my 1st path, and I got a good tone. I located the ring with my pinpointer. I was amazed I found it in about 30 minutes. My mom must have helped. I took a picture and sent it to Chris. He called me back about 10 minutes later, just as I was getting in my car as the skies opened up. He was in total shock. He said after he got the picture, he told his wife what happened. He said he was going to be in the dog house if I didn’t find the ring.
We met the next day to return the ring. Chris said he was allowed to go back to rugby practice.
I love my hobby!!
Haylee called me. Her great, great grandmother’s ring dropped between the boards of the deck. She looked immediately, looked later, had the boards pulled up and had several other people look as well. Two weeks passed and it was till not found. She called me to help out. I followed along as she shared her story. Based on what she said and the conditions present, she should have already found it herself. I picked up where she left off and couldn’t find it either. That is when we started questioning what actually happened. With a new approach it didn’t take long before I hit the sound I was looking for. Watch my video for the details and the beautiful reaction from Haylee.


TOPSAIL, NC
Alison was out on a boogie board that had a break in the foam causing the nose to dive down. This caused Alison’s hand to plunge hard into the sandy bottom. She felt her engagement ring get pulled off of her finger. About an hour after the loss, she found out about Crystal Coast Ring Finders. After speaking to her I loaded my equipment and headed to the Topsail beach location. A through grid search only provided 2 wires and a newer penny. I extended the search area to the west and received a strong signal on the Minelab Equinox 800. Before attempting to recover the item, I looked at Alison and her husband with my fingers crossed. Before Alison’s husband could get to me, I had her lost engagement ring in my hand.


Patrick and his wife were getting ready to tube down the Cannon River in Minnesota, while getting on the tube, Patrick saw his wedding band come off his hand and he tried his best to grab it. The ring disappeared into the river, about waist deep with a very rocky bottom. He tried to find it, and just couldn’t get it. He searched for help on the internet and found theringfinders.com – I met him down by the river and decided that scuba would be the best as the bottom was full of huge rocks and there is no way I could use a scoop to try and recover any signals. I found a few coins and some garbage as usual, though it only took about 15 – 20 minutes and that nice tone rang in my ears. I knew it was the ring.
Congrats Patrick, truly glad I could help!
Darrin


Timing can be critical to locate a lost item. Contact Crystal Coast Ring Finders after trying to pinpoint the area the item was lost.
Jesse was spending the day at the beach with his family and had taken off his ring because he didn’t want to lose it (ironically). The ring was placed in a pouch of a beach chair. Later that afternoon, they were packing up to leave and had forgot the ring was in the unzipped pouch. When the chair was folded and transported, the ring fell out into the sand without anyone noticing. Jesse didn’t realize it was missing until later that night. After searching all beach items and the vehicle, Jesse searched online and found TheRingFinders.com.
I was on the beach at the time I received his message and was about 8 miles away. I headed to where Jesse lost his ring immediately. After a few messages & calls, I had a good understanding of where Jesse’s family traveled on the beach. My Minelab CTX-3030 hit a solid tone and Jesse’s ring was revealed.
Nathan was body surfing at Mission beach when he realized that he was wearing his wedding ring, not something he normally does. In checking the ring to see how tight it was fitting, it came right off and dropped into waist deep surf. With our surf, it will disappear in a second, so, no way to spot it. A sad Nathan now had to go confess to the wife that his wedding band is gone. His wife wasn’t satisfied with accepting that fate, so, she found TheRingFinders.com on a search and contacted me for help. The ring was lost at a +4 foot tide, so, a minus .7 tide at 5:14 am was just the ticket for this search. Nathan met me at 3:15 am and showed me the search area. He even came out in the surf and helped me keep on my grid pattern. This section of beach was real clean. An hour and half later, I had only found 3 non-ferrous targets, 2 pull tabs and a junk ring. At that point I had changed direction on my grid and now went north-south instead of my earlier east-west. Second pass doing this in ankle deep or less water, and another 16 pull tab reading on my Equinox. Only this time, it looked this was going to be
Nathan’s ring. I called him over, and by the light of his flashlight, he saw it was indeed his ring. He now would have a much happier conversation with his wife when he got home. Next month is their 2nd wedding anniversary, so, this recovery will help the ring story continue into chapter 3. A pleasure to meet you Nathan, and thank you for the reward.
On July 9th, 2021 I received a text message from a person that had lost a ring on a beach and wanted to know if I could come and locate it for her. She told me it was up in Northern Minnesota at her Parents cabin. I could tell that she was somewhat panicked by the loss of a very sentimental ring. I tried to reassure her that It’s not going anywhere, and I would love to come and find it for her. She said they were going to give it another look in the morning and she would get back to me. The next day I received another text that she could not find it and I was given the address of where they were at. After looking up the address on Google maps I headed North. It was about 180 miles from where I was at and I loved every minute of the drive. What a beautiful day for a drive up north. I asked if it was ok if I brought my dog with for the ride and I was told by all means bring the dog.
About 3 hours later I arrived and was met by her mother and several yellow labs and a golden retriever in the driveway. My dog is a yellow lab as well and boy did those dogs hit it off. Running and playing. It was nice because my dog doesn’t get a chance very often to run with dogs her own size much. Before you know it they were in the water have a blast. I was shown the beach where the ring was lost and it was about a 30’ x 40’area. The ring was lost tossing a toy to one of the dogs. So a real direction was not known. It could have taken off in any direction, and maybe even backwards into the lake. I started to looking in the sand for the ring. On my 3rd pass back and forth I got a strong hit for something metallic just under the sand. I brought my sand scoop with to help make things easier. I took a couple of scoops and missed whatever it was. Then I had it in my scoop. A beautiful gold ring. It took less then 5 minutes to locate it. While the party that lost the ring was not around during the hunt she was quickly notified about the recovery and you just knew that everything was going to be OK. It was a honor going up and helping put the pieces of life back in order for one more person. To top it off, my dog was able to have a few playmates for a short time and we were back on the road. It was so nice meeting such a wonderful family, perfect summer day, and an absolute beautiful scenic drive to boot. It doesn’t get much better then tha
t.
