Diamond Ring Lost from Moving Vehicle in Monmouth, IL…Found
A couple of weeks ago I received a call for a ring search just over an hour from my home. Unfortunately, due to my schedule I was unable to attempt a locate of the ring until this past weekend. The ring was lost along a country gravel road near Monmouth, IL. Monica, the owner of the ring, was traveling down the road at approximately 40 MPH when she made a waving gesture out the window and off went her ring off into the ditch full of knee high grass. Fortunately, Monica immediately identified a nearby landmark so that she could recall the approximate area of the loss.
I met Monica’s husband at the location on Sunday morning and I was shown the most likely stretch of ditch that the ring may have landed. You can see from my photo that the location was about 50 yards long from where I was standing to my car in the distance. The grass was just waiting to be searched.
The grass was too tall for my larger coils, so I used my 6″ sniper coil on my Equinox 800 so that I could get easily get deep into the grass. I combed the roadway edge first, but came up empty. I worked my way into the ditch and searched completely from road edge to fence line. Eventually, I got a solid tone and a 15 on my VDI. I grabbed my Garrett carrot and pinpointed the target deep in the grass. As I moved the grass blades out of the way, the bright sun shined down on the ring and it reflected back at me. I picked it up and sure enough it was just like the one in a picture that Monica had sent to me.
Needless to say, I was glad to have found Monica’s ring. It is a beautiful ring and it was truly a memorable search that I won’t soon forget. I sent a text to Monica with only pictures of her ring. I immediately received a call from her and was she very grateful for this recovery. It was my pleasure to return her ring.
Phillip called me about midday asking if I would help him locate his wife’s engagement ring. It was lost in the water close to the shore line, ankle to calf deep and they had been searching for it by hand, snorkeling and they purchased a metal detector to no avail. It had been a couple days since lost and it was high tide at the time. He said because of emotional and sentimental reasons, the ring just had to be found. I said I would help and showed up late that same afternoon. This was my first visit and ring recovery at Fort Morgan so I wasn’t familiar with conditions and packed my equipment for all conditions. I searched an areas about 100 foot square with no Luck. There was only one target and when I dug it Phillip thought I had found it only to be disappointed when I pulled up a piece of wire. After performing a second search with no success I decided to first expand the search another 50 ft to the west. Now, remember the ring was lost at high tide and the beach had a gradual slope, for ever 1 foot drop of tide the horizontal distance was probably 15 or more feet. It’s was now low tide so I concentrated on the wet sand with no standing water. Within 10 minutes I got a good but weak signal, dug it and there it was. I felt it was lucky I came right out after called because the sand shifts about quickly around here and I’m afraid in another day or two it may have been buried to deep to detect. Phillip and the family were all smiles and grateful and now they can finish their vacation with no regrets. I am alway glad to help. 
