The summer festivities ended last Tuesday afternoon, July 6 at the dock where the Pasini family was celebrating.

Karin Pasini was enjoying the lake on a floatation device when she became entangled and slipped off.

"I panicked," she said. "When I came up I realized my wedding ring was gone."
Karin was devastated. She and husband George were married only a year ago in August. "I thought we were never going to see my ring again," Karin said.

"Everyone got so sad," said neighbor and friend Nancy Bateman.
"We were all just so unhappy," Karin added.

But the Pasini's had some very determined children and grandchildren and the search for Karin's ring was on.
"All the grandchildren were diving and trying to find it," Karin said.

"There were 14 kids and six adults out there diving and looking for her ring," said Bateman.
"I was sure with all the boat traffic it was useless for them to look," Karin said. "I just knew I would never see my ring again."
George Pasini offered to buy Karin a new ring, but she didn't want a new one, she wanted her ring back.
Undeterred by the lack of success, several in the Pasini/Bateman search party refused to give up.
Mark Simmons who is a retired firefighter from Chesapeake, Va., Travis Strausser who is a firefighter from Ohio and Robin Pasini, George Pasini's son, were determined to get Karin's ring back from Lake Gaston.
The ring was lost about eight feet from Bateman's dock in approximately 12 feet of water.
The firefighters in the group determined they needed scuba diving equipment to aid in the search for the ring. They searched on the Internet for places to rent scuba gear. "We called all around for the equipment and there was nothing close by Lake Gaston," Strausser said.
Late in the evening, Robin Pasini said he and Travis were leaving the house on the golf cart and saw some men working near by. "On a whim I stopped and asked those guys if they knew anybody around who had scuba gear," Robin Pasini said. "They suggested I ask a neighbor Mike Wright who is a firefighter that lives in Henrico."
Wright loaned the search party his dive tanks and scuba gear.
"Now the only thing we needed was to get the tanks filled," Simmons said.
So being firefighters, Simmons and Strausser said the only logical place to turn for help was fellow firefighters. The contacted the Roanoke Wildwood Volunteer Fire Department, "and they filled our tanks for us," Strausser said.
Wednesday morning, in order to give the lake time to calm down from the previous day's boating activity, Strausser, Simmons and Robin Pasini set about diving in the area where Karin had last had her ring on her finger.
After a few dives, the ring was found.
"I was so excited," Karin said. "I thought I had died and went to Heaven. I couldn't get there fast enough."
"I think she even climbed over top of a few grandchildren getting there," Bateman said.
Everyone was amazed that the ring was found, pretty close to where it was lost.
"With all the boating activity on the water Tuesday, it's just amazing," Strausser, said. "Visibility was only about two feet," Strausser said. He said that during some training exercises with his fire department dive team in Ohio, they had actually lost dummies they had placed for training purposes. "It is very difficult to find something in water with visibility that low."
"Everyone was just determined to find the ring," Simmons added. "We're firefighters, we don't give up."
Everyone was especially grateful to the aid from Lake Gaston firefighters. "I knew that if we called on fellow firefighters they would help us," Simmons said. "It's a brotherhood between firefighters."
Karin and George Pasini will celebrate their first wedding anniversary Aug. 27. Karin is ecstatic that she will celebrate with her original wedding band.

Reprinted with permission from the Lake Gaston Gazette-Observer