Plot
USCG pilot Lt Commander Pagnolini and his winchman Haig answer an SOS call at sea and arrive at a derelict schooner, the Requite. Haig lowers himself to the ship, where he finds three dead bodies along with one survivor, Eva, cowering in the cabin.
As the pilot attempts to retrieve Haig and Eva with a rescue basket, the line breaks, plunging the two into the ocean. After they swim back to the boat, the pilot informs Haig that he must return to base because his fuel is borderline. Eva and Haig spend the night on the boat, during which time she recounts the story of the storm that killed everyone else aboard. She explains to him that the strange events began soon after they found a priest drifting in the ocean, apparently a survivor of a disaster. Then, she tells Haig of the violent storm that caused all of the freakish deaths on the boat. One man was hurled through a hatch; one is hanging from the ship's mast; another vanished before her eyes; and a fourth man is in an aft compartment, floating in the air.
Eva attributes the deaths to supernatural causes, but Haig has a practical explanation for everything, including the man who appears to be floating in the air and is actually impaled on a fish's snout. Eva is comforted and has sex with Haig. Early the next morning, the pilot returns along with the Coast Guard cutter Venturous. Haig and Eva are transferred from the Requite to the deck of the Venturous, where they board the helicopter for the flight back to Miami. At the same time, Coast Guard personnel from the Venturous investigate the wrecked schooner.
The story takes a bizarre turn when the Venturous' captain calls Haig to tell him that what they found on the ship was not what Haig reported. The individual hanging from the mast was in fact a woman.
Eva grins evilly and turns into the priest, claims Haig and pushes him out of the helicopter to his death. The priest then turns to Pagnolini and instructs him to beg for salvation, but the pilot rejects the Devil. The priest kills him without touching him and the helicopter crashes into the sea. The priest survives and floats away as we then see Haig come back to life. He waves at a distant ship as it approaches to rescue him, but he has an evil grin on his face.
The second USS Absecon (AVP-23) was a United States Navy Barnegat-class seaplane tender in commission from 1943 to 1947, converted during construction to serve as a catapult training ship during World War II. The ship was in commission in the United States Coast Guard as the cutter USCGC Absecon (WAVP-374), later WHEC-374, from 1949 to 1972. Transferred to South Vietnam in 1972, she served in the Republic of Vietnam Navy as the frigate RVNS Pham Ngu Lao (HQ-15) until she was captured by North Vietnam at the conclusion of the Vietnam War in 1975. After that, she served in the Socialist Republic of Vietnam's Vietnam People's Navy as PRVSN Pham Ngu Lao (HQ-01).
A pilot boat is a type of boat used to transport maritime pilots between land and the inbound or outbound ships that they are piloting. Pilot boats were once sailing boats that had to be fast because the first pilot to reach the incoming ship got the business. Today, pilot boats are scheduled by telephoning the ship agents/representatives prior to arrival.
The Perfect Storm is a 2000 American disaster drama film directed by Wolfgang Petersen and based on the 1997 creative non-fiction book of the same name by Sebastian Junger. The film was adapted by William D. Wittliff, with an uncredited rewrite by Bo Goldman, and tells the story of the Andrea Gail, a commercial fishing vessel that was lost at sea with all hands after being caught in the Perfect Storm of 1991. The film stars George Clooney, Mark Wahlberg, Diane Lane, William Fichtner, Karen Allen, Bob Gunton, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, and John C. Reilly.
The MV George Prince ferry disaster was a nautical disaster that occurred in the Mississippi River in St. Charles Parish, Louisiana, United States, on the morning of October 20, 1976. The Luling–Destrehan Ferry George Prince was struck by the Norwegian tanker SS Frosta, which was traveling upriver. The collision occurred at mile post 120.8 above Head of Passes, less than three-quarters of a mile from the construction site of the Luling Bridge which would replace the ferry seven years later. The ferry was crossing from Destrehan, Louisiana on the East Bank to Luling, Louisiana on the West Bank. Ninety-six passengers and crew were aboard the ferry when it was struck, and seventy-eight perished. This accident is the deadliest ferry disaster in United States history. It is also the deadliest peacetime nautical disaster involving a non-submersible vessel in U.S. waters since the explosion of the SS Grandcamp in 1947, which killed 581 people. In addition, it is the deadliest accident involving a single vessel in U.S waters since a fire on board the SS Morro Castle in 1934, which killed 137 people.
Air-sea rescue, and aeronautical and maritime search and rescue (AMSAR) by the ICAO and IMO, is the coordinated search and rescue (SAR) of the survivors of emergency water landings as well as people who have survived the loss of their seagoing vessel. ASR can involve a wide variety of resources including seaplanes, helicopters, submarines, rescue boats and ships. Specialized equipment and techniques have been developed. Both military and civilian units can perform air-sea rescue. Its principles are laid out in the International Aeronautical and Maritime Search and Rescue Manual. The International Convention on Maritime Search and Rescue is the legal framework that applies to international air-sea rescue.
Joshua James was an American sea captain and a U.S. Life–Saving Station keeper. He was a famous and celebrated commander of civilian life-saving crews in the 19th century, credited with saving over 500 lives from the age of about 15 when he first associated himself with the Massachusetts Humane Society until his death at the age of 75 while on duty with the United States Life–Saving Service. During his lifetime he was honored with the highest medals of the Humane Society and the United States. His father, mother, brothers, wife, and son were also lifesavers in their own right.
USCGC Seneca, or before 1915 USRC Seneca, was a United States Coast Guard cutter built and commissioned as a "derelict destroyer" with the specific mission of locating and then destroying abandoned shipwrecks that were still afloat and were a menace to navigation. She was designed with excellent sea-keeping qualities, a long cruising range, good towing capabilities, and by necessity the capacity to store a large amount of munitions. She was one of five Coast Guard cutters serving with the U.S. Navy in European waters during World War I.
King & Winge was one of the most famous ships ever built in Seattle, Washington, United States. Built in 1914, in the next 80 years she had participated in a famous Arctic rescue, been present at a great maritime tragedy, and been employed as a halibut schooner, a rum runner, a pilot boat, a yacht, and a crabber. She sank in high seas, without loss of life, in 1994.
HMS Lark was a 16-gun ship sloop of the Cormorant class, launched in 1794 at Northfleet. She served primarily in the Caribbean, where she took a number of prizes, some after quite intensive action. Lark foundered off San Domingo in August 1809, with the loss of her captain and almost all her crew.
Bluebelle was a 60-foot (18 m) twin-masted sailing ketch based out of Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The ship was scuttled following an act of mass murder by the ship's captain, Julian Harvey, on November 12, 1961. Harvey died by suicide on November 17 within hours of receiving news that 11-year-old Terry Jo Duperrault had survived the scuttling. She had been rescued at sea three and a half days after the incident, having drifted upon a small cork dinghy without food, water, or shelter for approximately 82 hours.
Board of Pilot Commissioners for the Bays of San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun is the California state agency responsible for licensing and regulating pilots within one of the largest harbors in the world and the tributary Sacramento River delta. It licenses and regulates up to 60 pilots of the San Francisco Bar Pilots Association. They are called "bar pilots" because they maneuver ships across a large and dangerous sand bar just outside the Golden Gate at the mouth of San Francisco Bay.
The West Indies Anti-Piracy Operations were a series of military operations and engagements undertaken by the United States Navy against pirates in and around the Antilles. Between 1814 and 1825, the American West Indies Squadron hunted pirates on both sea and land, primarily around Cuba and Puerto Rico. After the capture of Roberto Cofresi in 1825, acts of piracy became rare, and the operation was considered a success, although limited occurrences went on until slightly after the start of the 20th century.
HNLMS Groningen is a Holland-class offshore patrol vessel operated by the Royal Netherlands Navy.
The Thomas S. Negus was a 19th-century two-masted Sandy Hook pilot boat, built by C. & R. Poillon shipyard in Brooklyn in 1873 for the New Jersey maritime pilots. She was built to replace the pilot boat Jane, No. 1, which sank in early 1873. She was the winner of a $1,000 prize at the Cape May Regatta in 1873. She was named for Thomas S. Negus, president of the N. J. Pilots' Commissioners. In 1897, she left the pilot service to prospect for gold during the Klondike Gold Rush.
The Friend was a 19th-century pilot boat built by Daniel D. Kelley & Holmes East Boston shipyard in 1848 for Boston pilots. She helped transport Boston maritime pilots between inbound or outbound ships coming into the Boston Harbor. The Friend was one of the last of the low sided, straight sheared schooners built in the 1840s for Boston pilots. The second Boston pilot boat Friend was built in 1887. Her name came from the older Friend that was in the service in the late 1840s. Captain Thomas Cooper sold the Friend to New York pilots in 1893. Cooper replaced the Friend with the pilot-boat Columbia in 1894.
The Coquette was a 19th-century yacht and pilot boat, built in 1845 by Louis Winde, at the Winde & Clinkard shipyard in Chelsea, Massachusetts for yachtsmen James A. Perkins. Her design was based on a model by shipbuilder Dennison J. Lawlor. The Coquette was a good example of an early American yacht with a clipper bow. As a yacht, she won the attention for outsailing the larger New York yacht Maria at the second New York Yacht Club regatta in 1846. Perkins sold the Coquette to the Boston Pilots' Association for pilot service in 1848. She continued as a pilot boat until 1867 when she was sold as a Blackbirder to be used on the African coast.
The William Starkey was a 19th-century pilot boat built in 1854, by Benjamin F. Delano at the Thatcher Magoun shipyard for W. W. Goddard, of Boston. Starkey helped transport Boston maritime pilots between inbound or outbound ships coming into the Boston Harbor. She was named for Captain William Starkey, one of the founders of the Boston Marine Society. The Virginia Pilots' Association purchased the Boston schooner William Starkey in 1865, where she became a pioneer of the associations' fleet and the oldest pilot boat on the Atlantic and Gulf coasts. In the age steam, she was sold in 1899 to Thomas Darling of Hampton, Virginia.
The William W. Ker was a 19th-century Pennsylvania pilot schooner built in 1889 in Wilmington, Delaware. She was designed by Edward Burgess for the Pennsylvania pilots and was built for speed. She was a favorite with the pilots and was considered the fastest pilot boat on the coast. The Ker was hit and sank by a steamer off the Five Fathom Bank in 1900.
