The first of two recoveries at Doubtless Bay this week….
I was contacted by a friend of Dean after she heard he had lost his wedding ring in the sea a couple of weeks previously.
Hand crafted in the Shetland Islands off Scotland, he only wore it on special occasions.
Dean had taken a dip at Coopers Beach before the wedding, and felt the ring slip off his finger while in the water.
He had given it up as lost, as so many unfortunately do, but his friend Joanne heard about it and contacted me.
Although we had had rough seas since the loss which would have put it a little deeper under fresh sand, two weeks head start was still a very high probability of success for Coopers.
Unfortunately no-one who was there on the day was available, so by playing « Chinese Whispers » with Dean over the phone and some guidance from Joanne as to their regular swim spot I made a start.
Dean mentioned he had been « pretty much straight out from the kayaks », I arrived and found the cluster of kayaks tied up under the trees and set to work.
The search area progressively grew larger and larger – I operate to 95+ probability of detection and the search pattern markers in the sand expanded further outwards with no sign of the ring.
I had just closed off the area, and started to work on the wildcard possibilities. Unlikely to hold the ring, but I always close off the What-If scenarios, so often they aren’t where people think they should be.
Looking back across the search grid, I was happy I hadn’t missed it. Had a casual walker spotted it and picked it up? Was it really here?
Joanne arrived as I was starting to expand the area yet again, and informed me that Dean was referring to her kayaks further up the beach – that were no longer there as they had been removed before the rough weather!
Back to square one.
Search 2 now started in front of the kayaks that were no longer there…
I worked the new grid, but after another hour, there was nothing but the usual metallic rubbish of ancient bottle caps, can pull tabs and a couple of aluminium rivet heads worn off dinghies years ago.
Joanne had to head off with the kids, so I said I’d finish the next sweep and call it quits.
That sweep finished, I wasn’t ready to let it go so started another, and another… It takes a lot for me to walk away from a ring.
Joanne was long gone when, a quiet tone in the headphones, very faint – almost imperceptible but a definite fluctuation in the threshold hum of the machine but consistent.
I glanced at the display, the detector software didn’t even know it was there! My experienced ears could hear it though.
The scoop went in, me standing on it with all my weight to force it through the layers of tightly packed shell, and the signal remained in the hole.
Another bite, and another until in the fluid sand at the bottom of the hole I saw a flash of yellow nearly 40cm down.
I reached in and pulled a handful of sand out – As my fingers unfolded, the outline of Deans wedding ring emerged.
I sent a text to both Dean and Joanne – « Gottit! »
Dean was back up from Auckland the following weekend, and we arranged a meet to reunite him with the ring.
