Mangonui Tag | The Ring Finders

Important Key Lost in House – Found by Intensive Search

  • from Paihia (New Zealand)

Kim phoned me on behalf of a friend asking if I was able to do a house search for an important key.
I generally don’t do domestic searches for lost items purely because they can be. by necessity, very intrusive into peoples ‘space’.

Whilst conventional metal detectors are ineffective inside houses, I have a range of small coils, pinpointers and remote cameras to aid a physical search.

Kim explained the circumstances: Her elderly friend had lent their car to another elderly friend – who had misplaced the key.
It could have been anywhere from the car to inside the house, maybe in a wood shed…or, who knows?

Knowing the significant expense and hassle involved in an insurance claim, especially for an 80-something year old, I agreed.
Though it was over 100km away, the travel would largely be covered by a Pay-It-Forward recovery I had done recently.

I arrived the following morning and met with Jan, she was most apologetic as we went through retracing her steps as best we could, and I explained how I would be conducting the search.
Starting with the car, the last known point where she would have had the key, I began the systematic and meticulous elimination of areas.
With the car and driveway cleared, the search progressed up onto the deck and then into the house.

From here it was a matter of examining everything Jan had, or had potentially interacted with the previous day. On, in, under, beside, behind…

An hour later, in the bottom of a box of assorted dog leashes, treats and toys etc. a shape caught my eye.

I held up a key,  » This it? »

Lost earring at Cable Bay, Mangonui – Found using Metal Detector.

  • from Paihia (New Zealand)

Alexandra had been with family at Little Cable Bay in Doubtless Bay, enjoying the sun and a warm but deep rockpool during the day.
She was understandably very upset to learn later that she had lost a very precious gold and diamond earring.
Her partner contacted me as to whether it was possible to recover it.
Unfortunately, I had spent the day conducting a dive search for a lost propeller in a marina at Whangarei, so was too tired to make the drive safely that night. however I was able to negotiate with my long-suffering boss to take the afternoon off the following day and headed up to search for it.
There were two high probability areas; Where they had been based on the beach, and the rockpool.
I quickly scanned the indicated area on the beach, although nothing found.
So, a quick trip back to the car to change in preparation to get wet in the rockpool, accessible only at low tide.
Alexandra had to head back to work so left me to it.
An earlier promising signal in the rockpool turned out to be an ancient 2c piece, followed by an old fishing knife, and many small fishing leads.
Confident the time-critical pool was cleared, I returned to the beach and started a systematic high level search of the dry sand.
About an hour later, the earring surfaced in the scoop, some 15m away from where it was supposed to be, and probably flicked off a towel.
Alexandra met me later in Coopers Beach for an exchange of big smiles and the earring.

Car Keys « Lost » on State Highway – Found

  • from Paihia (New Zealand)

The sole purpose of a ringfinder, is to find the lost item, not to judge. Believe me, we’ve heard it all…

I’ll call him Bob.

Bob phoned me just on sunset, « I’ve lost my car keys on the side of the road… »

He was just down the road, so 15 minutes later I pulled up behind their car.

Bob came up to meet me while his partner sat in the car.

As he told me the first version of the story, the Search and Rescue training kicked in and I was assessing the scene and the behavioral profiling. My very first question was, « Were they thrown? » with a knowing grin.

He sheepishly admitted that maybe there was some velocity involved, during a ‘discussion’ with his partner.

Personally, I don’t care if it was thrown in anger, or even lost through some embarrassing and less than rational action, but please do be honest with the guy who turns up to look for it for you.

The side of the highway at the bottom of a hill was loaded with trash signals from litter which had washed down over the years, and it was really hard graft with signals coming from all over.

I jumped the nearby farm fence and cleared the extents that they might have gone into the neighboring paddock, nothing found so it was back into the trash…

Changing up the gear to cope with the many drink cans and bits of car etc, I started a more focussed search, and 15 minutes later just on dark I held up the keys.

I got a « No Way! » from his partner as she emerged from the car, and it was high fives all round.

I can only imagine the conversation as they drove away…

 

 

 

Tiny Gold Ear Ring Found in Sand at Cable Bay.

  • from Paihia (New Zealand)
Danielle contacted me after losing her tiny gold and diamond earring at Little Cable Bay, between Mangonui and Taipa.
She had spent some considerable time looking for it, but in the dry sand a tiny earring that blended in perfectly would have been virtually invisible to the eye.
I wasn’t able to get away from work for a few hours, but in this instance it worked out well with the tides.
She had sent me a photo which showed some trees lined up as a reference, so I could make a start as soon as I got there.
It didn’t take long to locate myself in the right spot and I started work, a very tedious process with a lot of interference from metallic rubbish that saturated the dry sands above the high tide line.
Danielle arrived soon after and was able to give me her best guess as to where it might be.
With a high probability location now identified, I changed up a few settings and started listening for the tiniest wisp of gold in among all the can tabs and flakes of tinfoil.
It was hard mentally processing each individual signal, digging the probable signals and flagging the unlikely, but possibles to revisit later if necessary.
About 10 minutes in, with the coil running under the surface of the loose and fluid dry sand, I got a repeatable signal only just audible over nearby rubbish.
I ran my hand through the sand, nothing was seen and the pinpointer didn’t pick it up, but I had moved the target. Was it yet another tiniest fragment of ancient drink can?
Slowly I progressively eliminated ever smaller piles of sand until there was one small heap left.
I grabbed it and slowly opened out my hand, scrutinising the grains as they fell through the slightest gap between my fingers, until resting in my palm was the distinctive shape of an earring.
Danielles eyes lit up when she realised her precious lost earring had been found in amongst several trillion grains of sand.

Gold Ring Found in Doubtless Bay Chicken Coop

  • from Paihia (New Zealand)

I was recommended to Kim and Kevin after Kevin had lost his Great Grandfathers ring, passed down to the eldest son through the generations. His father sadly passed away recently and Kevin became the new custodian.  Understandably, the ring carries a huge sentimental attachment.
Kevin wasn’t sure where, or when, he had lost it.
He just knew that it wasn’t beside the sink after he’d finished washing his hands after working in the garden that morning.
He had a few sleepless nights before the day of the search!

On site, I retraced Kevins activities. I made note of each area of interest and ranked them as to the likelihood of holding the ring as we wandered around the property.
There were three probable areas, but I had brought the remote camera with me, just in case it got all forensic with nooks and crannies (Or « Crooks and Nannies » as I like to call them).

First up was the garden where he had been planting seedlings and weeding. Lots of wisps of wire and assorted metal with the big coil, I switched to the small handheld coil.
This was better in among the random signals, but slow going to ensure every coil sweep was overlapped to avoid missing a single square inch.

Then I headed down to the chicken run where he had spread some hay out.
Several problems were encountered in here; The abundance of metal chicken mesh in close quarters, the fact that every time I stopped to investigate a target under the hay at least one chicken adopted me as a fancy perch with foot-warming function… and, let’s just say I was glad I was wearing disposable gloves as well!

Despite the assistance in removing various invertebrates, the chickens and I did not locate the ring in the run.Spotting fresh straw had also been placed in the nest boxes, I moved outside – thankful to be vertical and chicken-free.
I worked my way through each of the nest boxes, when my fingers closed on a heavy, round ring buried under the sawdust.

I left it under the watchful gaze of the chooks, while I took my gear back to the car then called out to Kevin.
« I’ve got something of yours! »,  and led him and his wife to the chicken run.

I opened up the nest box and Kevin reached in to retrieve the ring.

It remains a mystery how and why it came off here, as it is a tight fit on his finger and the nest box was not a ‘likely’ area.
We could only assume that the strings when carrying the bales had worked it down his finger without him noticing – only to drop off as he fluffed up the sawdust.

Regardless, Kevin had now been reunited with his Great Grandfathers ring.

Job done.