I got the call on Thursday the 14th about an hour before I was to leave to go down to Kentucky to hunt with two friends and get out of the frozen north. It was Al, my local metal detector dealer. He shared that he had got a call from a Kalamazoo County detective. ( Yes there really is a Kalamazoo! ) They needed a team to look for a stolen loaded handgun. I am the president of the SW MI Seek & Search Club So Al called me to put together a team. I called the detective and got some information. I told him I could put together a few guys quickly but I couldn't come because I was going out of town. He said if I could put together a team on Monday that would be great.
So off to Kentucky with my Minelab Explorer II to find Civil War relics and old coins I went. And old coins and relics is what we found. Fast forward to Monday morning. Five club members and myself met with a detective at 10 am. A couple hours before we started it started snowing and it was a little below freezing outside.
A short one mile drive later we were at the very trashy wooded lot where the gun was said to be thrown into. Turns out two teens had broken into some cars and stole the gun from one of them. About 45 minutes later the cops were hot on their heels so they threw the gun into this wooded lot.
The police went there the next day and with details of where the kid was when he threw it. They started their search with several law enforcement officers, one K9, and one metal detector and in five hours they could not come up with it. Our group of six club members started searching the lightly snow covered lot and quickly found there was targets all over the place. Twice I went back to the spot where it was said to be thrown from to get a visual of where it might be. We even looked into the trees to see if it had got hung up in some limbs. About 30 minutes into the hunt I heard a beep and seen the outline of the gun on the ground. I called out to the detectives up at the road and said "I got it " It was maybe 70 feet from the place it was thrown from.
It was a fully loaded Ruger 380. All the guys came over and everyone wanted to hear what it sounded like under their coils. Three of them could hardly pick it up. The gun was mostly plastic except the barrel and slide that were made of steel. That is why I brought my X-TERRA 30 because I could put it in all metal and hear everything.
I use my X-TERRA 30 for competition hunts, tot lots, snow hunting, and beach hunting for that reason. The group looked around and there were several houses less than 50 yards from where the gun was found and some had kids swing sets in the yards. It sure felt good getting that out of those woods as there were also some toys found in there where the kids had been playing. No telling what might have happened if a kid had found it first.
I want to thank the Kalamazoo Law Enforcement team for calling on us to help find it. I also want to thank Tom, Keith, Charlie, Mark, and John for showing up to help in the search, and Minelab for making some awesome machines that help me to make many great finds!
Mike - MI, USA
