There was a diamond in the rough — or in this case, a heap of hundreds of bags of New York City garbage.
A Manhattan woman who accidentally trashed her wedding and engagement rings recovered the treasures days later with the help of the city Sanitation Department, after rifling through a massive pile of trash at a New Jersey waste station.
Shannon Lombardo, 46, said that after searching her Upper West Side apartment for the missing rings, she realized she had likely tossed them in the trash with a pile of tissues after taking them off to clean them.
At her sister’s urging, she called 311 — expecting to get the brushoff.
“I was thinking, it’s New York City Sanitation, there’s no way I’m ever going to be able to track down my ring,” she said. “I was just very skeptical, but I had nothing left to lose.”
But the city held off on pickups from her building to allow her to rifle through the building’s trash in case it hadn’t yet been collected — which turned up nothing.
Then, Shannon and her husband Jim Lombardo, who have been married for close to nine years and have two kids, headed for a Fairview, N.J., facility where city trash is dumped before being sent to landfills.
Workers were able to pinpoint the truck her garbage would be in based on her address and stopped it when it arrived, dumping its load of 800 bags.
Shannon Lombardo (r.) with her husband, James, says her rings shine brighter after digging through garbage to find them.
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Shannon Lombardo (r.) with her husband, James, says her rings shine brighter after digging through garbage to find them.
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Shannon Lombardo (r.) with her husband, James, says her rings shine brighter after digging through garbage to find them.
The Lombardos started digging alongside sanitation worker Sekou Callender and waste management manager Joe Skrenta.
“Everyone was there to help out. It wasn’t a pretty job,” Shannon Lombardo said. “There was mostly a lot of dog crap, coffee (grounds) and sauces — I was surprised at how wet it was.”
After an hour of digging, they located the Lombardos’ trash bag — and inside it, the two platinum rings nestled in some tissues.
“Sure enough, there it was,” Shannon Lombardo said. “I was shocked. I just couldn’t believe that it really happened … Everyone was excited. I don’t know who was more excited.”
Lombardo said she’ll keep a closer eye now on the rings — which carry greater meaning after the show of good will to help her out.
“You’re talking about marriage and commitment — when the two of us are standing in a dump, the commitment’s there,” she said. “To me, now the diamonds are even brighter.”
“These people went above and beyond — amazing people,” she added. “Now, that’s what the ring symbolizes: that there’s hope and goodness in the world, and against the odds it can happen — even in a garbage dump.”
