Sanitation Workers Sifted Through 800 Bags of Trash to Find Wedding Ring

46-year-old Shannon Lombardo in New York accidentally threw out her wedding ring and her engagement ring. She had set the rings in a paper towel after cleaning them, and threw it in the trash.

By the time she realized what had happened, the city had already picked up the trash from her building. She just figured they were gone for good.

Someone at the sanitation department told her not to give up. So Shannon and her husband went to a processing center in Jersey where they store trash before it goes to a landfill.

Workers were able to pinpoint the garbage truck that picked up their trash, and narrowed it down to a pile of 800 bags. Sekou Callender and Gabriel Moreno, two workers, helped sift through it all. Gabriel found the rings less than an hour later.

Shannon says the rings have new meaning to her now, because it proved there's "hope and goodness in the world." Gabriel says this type of thing is pretty common though, and they train for it.

Department of Sanitation