'Miraculous' recovery of wedding ring lost in sea

Christopher Brightmore and his wife, Kathleen, have matching wedding rings

A Cleethorpes man who lost his wedding ring, which he had worn for more than half a century, while swimming in the sea in Dubai has described its recovery by a diver as "a miracle".

Christopher Brightmore said he had constantly worn his ring for 51 years and had never removed it during that time.

However, during a family holiday in December, it slipped off while he was swimming and the wedding ring dropped to the seabed.

Even with the help of his wife and daughter, the former police officer was unable to recover it.

Christopher Brightmore (right) found the ring with the help of an ex-diver

After posting about his misfortune on a site for ex-pats, he borrowed a metal detector and tried to find the ring again without luck.

During the search, he was approached by a former professional diver named Adam Whitehead who spent two hours helping him with his snorkelling gear.

Mr Brightmore said he had given the search up as a bad job and thought the ring would be lost forever.

"I couldn't go on any longer and we were just getting out of the water when Adam pops up from the depths holding my ring in his hand and shouting 'Eureka, I've found it'," said Mr Brightmore.

"He found it in 10ft of water, under 3in of sand.

"I mean, it was a miracle, it was miraculous and we were overjoyed."

'Sentimental value'

He described his wedding band as "so precious" because his wife Kathleen has a matching one.

"The sentimental value of this thing was such that I just had to find it," he said.

Having learnt his lesson, he now removes the ring from his finger before swimming, Mr Brightmore added.

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