Visually
impressive re-creation of astonishing true life sea rescue
In early
1952 a winter storm whipped up the seas around the town of Chatham in Cape Cod
and remarkably two oil tankers were split in half by the raging waters. While
the local rescue service was focussed on the more accessible SS Fort Mercer, a
crew of just four set off to try and rescue survivors from the SS Pendleton.
This entailed a journey which saw them having to ride over giant waves and
somehow find the ship without a compass which gets blown overboard. Meanwhile
those left on half of the Pendleton did their utmost to keep the ship afloat
and wait to be rescued. If you read the plot for this film you’d imagine it as
an unlikely fiction but it is actually a true story of amazing courage and
determination from both sides of the rescue attempt recognised as the finest in
the history of the US Coast Guard.
