Ring found on rooftop blocks away from tornado-ravaged home

Jan. 30 (UPI) -- A former college soccer star's championship ring was found on a rooftop a few blocks away from her Texas home months after it was carried off by a tornado.

Jacob Kilcrease, an insurance adjuster with State Farm, said he was inspecting a rooftop in Garland when a small object caught his eye.

The object turned out to be a Stephen F. Austin State University conference championship ring inscribed with the name Chelsea Raymond.

Kilcrease said he searched for the name online and found a news report about Raymond losing all four of her conference championship rings when an EF 2 tornado ripped through her home in October. One of the rings had been found in an alleyway by a neighbor the day after the tornado, but three remained missing.

Raymond's home is located a few blocks away from the house where Kilcrease found the ring on the roof.

Kilcrease and Raymond met in person Wednesday and the former soccer star identified the ring as her freshman year conference championship memento.

Raymond's tornado-swept ring traveled a few blocks, but fell far short of the distance traveled by a Wisconsin man's high school class ring. Kevin Kinney said he lost his ring while traveling through Europe in 1977 and the ring turned up more than 40 years later in the possession of a woman in Australia.