Sandy returns ring lost at sea

Susanne Cervenka | Asbury Park (N.J.) Press

This could be a fish tale, except this time, the catch did not get away.

Just over 10 years ago, Bryan Heller went swimming in the Atlantic Ocean off a public beach in Sea Bright, N.J. But while he came out of the water, his Rumson-Fair Haven Regional High School ring, which had been on his hand, did not.

His ring, it seemed, was just another treasure claimed by the sea.

Fast forward a decade, a superstorm named Sandy and hundreds of thousands of cubic yards of sand later. That's what it took for the sea to suddenly return the ring.

"I was kind of shocked," said Heller, 28, now a project manager with an environmental engineering consultant and newlywed.

"Ten years ago, I thought it was gone forever."

But what seems like a tall tale is actually an example of the sheer power of Sandy, which moved an estimated 500,000 cubic yards of sand in Sea Bright and Monmouth Beach, experts say.

"When a storm is as a big as Sandy, it can mix up the bottom. Normally it is just transporting sand from one location to another, but if there is something in there storms can mix that up and move it around," said Jon Miller, professor of coastal engineering at Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken.

Millers said the items could have either been on the ocean floor well off shore and the waves from Sandy brought it on shore. Or they were buried in the sand and the erosion from Sandy unearthed them.

Sandy, for example, exposed a long-lost boardwalk in Bay Head, Miller said. Dozens of pairs of sunglasses showed up on that same beach a year before after Hurricane Irene.

Heller's class ring is at least the second story of an item lost in the ocean turning up after Sandy. A Seaside Heights, N.J., family found amid storm debris a bottle thrown into the ocean 50 years ago by a then-12-year-old boy on vacation.

And massive storms elsewhere have unearthed cars and shipwrecks, Miller said.

While much smaller, Heller's ring proved to be a big find for those involved.

David Williams, 51, of Keyport, N.J., found Heller's ring in August while he was doing masonry work to rebuild a foundation at a Sea Bright home near the border of Monmouth Beach."I just happened to be going through some stuff and saw something shiny on the ground. I thought, 'What the heck is this?' and I pick it up," he said. "And it was a class ring."

Using his Android smartphone and the details of the ring — Rumson Fair Haven, Bryan and wrestling are etched on the side — Williams was able to find Heller after only about an hour of searching when he had moments to stop in between work.

Williams eventually found Heller's LinkedIn page, which lists the Wall Township consulting firm where he works, and placed a call, leaving a message.

Heller listened politely to the man on the other end of the phone, but he felt certain what he was hearing about his high school class ring couldn't be true.

Heller last saw the ring in June 2003 — about three weeks, he estimated, after he got it — before he went for a swim in the Atlantic Ocean off Sea Bright, most likely at the public beach were his friends were lifeguards. He noticed it was gone when he came out of the water, and thought, "Well, that was the end of that."

The lost high school ring became a wisecrack for Heller, especially after earning a varsity ring from wrestling at Penn State.

"I joked that I would not wear it in the ocean," he said.

But still, Heller returned Williams call.

"I told him, 'I'm pretty sure you don't have my ring,'" Heller said. "There's no way. My ring is somewhere at the bottom of the ocean."

It wasn't until Williams read to him the inscription inside the ring, "Bryan James Bishop Heller," that Heller began to believe it.

The photo Williams texted him confirmed it.

Williams said he took the ring immediately to the post office, double-wrapped it, placed it in a bubble envelope and sent it off to Heller, tickled that he found the owner.

"I lost my class ring in a similar fashion and I could be kicking myself. It's something that's kind of precious to you," he said. "I'm glad it got returned to its rightful owner. It made me feel good that he was as excited as I was to get it back."

Heller admits he probably won't wear the class ring much. His wedding ring is his daily jewelry staple; his Penn State ring comes out for special alumni events.

But "to have it back is awesome," he said. "It's a time stamp in my life. It's a good memory."