Nick snapped out of the moment and fell back into his title, Commander Armstrong of the First Air Rescue Team.

Walking back to the landing pad, he stopped, getting an odd sense of foreboding. Nick had the ability to feel trouble, and it was no different tonight. He took a diverted path up to the bridge, where it was already buzzing with activity. He could hear the crackling of a radio call coming over the speaker.

The unsteady and forlorn voice of a man rang out over the Ops Radio: Mayday, Mayday, Mayday . . . This is the Southern Belle . . . We are at 59 degrees . . . 10 minutes North . . . 146 . . . 47 degrees . . . This is the Southern Belle . . . Storm . . . High seas . . . taking on water . . . listing 40 degrees to starboard . . .

The young radio technician, Seaman Harper, hopped into action, keenly focused on his radio and notepad.

Harper was barely nineteen and fresh out of boot camp. As such, he was showing visible nerves as he responded to the Mayday call, his voice cracking.

“This is US Coast Guard Cutter Orca on 121.5 Southern Belle. Need to know if you are in need of assistance? Over.”

“Absolutely! We are going down!”

“Roger. This is the US Coast Guard, understand you are going down, requesting number of persons on board? Over.”

Following the last transmission of the Coast Guard dispatcher, the radios fell silent, a sure sign the Southern Belle had succumbed to the storm that was still increasing in intensity over the Bering Sea. Harper finished typing all of the information into the Coast Guard computer, which fed information to the rest of the fleet.

The ship’s captain sat still, calm, and quiet, with very little emotion on his face. He glanced over at Nick standing in the bridge doorway and spoke in a low Texas drawl. “Go give ‘em hell, Nick.”

With the slap of his palm on a big red button on the wall, the general alarm sounded on the Cutter. The alarm rang out with a sound akin to some old World War II siren, the type of alarm you would expect to hear if a nuclear bomb had gone off.

“I guess that’s me,” Nick said with a smile, his adrenaline already pumping.

He quickly made his way down to the flight crew ready room to suit up. Despite the danger of flying into the heart of a storm over churning, frigid seas that would kill you in minutes should you find yourself in the water, Nick couldn’t help but love his job. Maybe it was how beautiful his orange and white helicopter was—an HH60 or Jayhawk, the Coast Guard version of the Army’s Blackhawk. Maybe it was just the rush. He didn’t care. He loved what he did.

In the cockpit of the Jayhawk, flight computers came online as the helicopter woke up with the whine of turbine engines and turning rotor blades. Gail was ready to go next to him so Nick leaned back, peering behind him to check on the two men in the rear of the chopper, a paramedic and a rescue diver.

“You two buckled in?”

“Sir, yes sir!”

“All right, let’s get this show on the road. Gail, call for departure.”

With checklists complete, First Officer Gail nodded at Nick and got on the radio to request departure clearance from the ship.

“Orca, this is CG6055 ready for departure.”

“CG6055, this is Orca, wind 3-4-0 at 2-5 cleared for departure. Be careful out there, it’s getting rough.”

“Okay cleared for departure . . . and you know our motto, we deliver . . .”

The HH60 Jayhawk lifted off the deck of the Orca and started a low northward turn to the right. The helicopter whirled from the deck. The dust and spray on the deck from them being out to sea for a week swirled around the men below them. Highly motivated to reach the Southern Belle, the craft sped into the darkness.

“This is one hell of a storm,” Nick commented as hail began striking the windscreen.

The Jayhawk bounced around as it fought against the high winds. Nick did his best to keep it on course as he scanned the roiling sea below.

“Do you see anything yet?” a muffled voice yelled.

“No, not yet,” Nick replied.

It wasn’t ten minutes into the bumpy flight when they spotted a strobe beacon and a bright yellow raft. It was just a yellow speck against an evil, dark-blue backdrop.

“I see them over there,” Gail shouted as she hit Nick’s arm.

“I’ll get us into position.”

Nick lined up the helicopter over the raft, trying his best to keep it level. The rescue diver lowered himself into the basket, preparing for what was to follow. He gave a thumbs up to the medic as he began going down. The swells were getting bigger and climbing higher. Mother Nature was doing her damnedest to take them all down.

The waves pounded the little raft and slammed into the rescue basket. One at a time, they pulled the four stranded, frozen men out of the raft and into the Jayhawk.

“CG6055 . . . this is Orca . . . what’s your status?” The captain’s southern accent rang out in Nick’s headset.

“We’re pulling the last one onboard now, sir . . . ETA back to ship, 15 minutes. Need medics and fuel.”

With the last rescued fisherman on board, Nick turned the battered Jayhawk back toward the ship.

The lightning was cracking even harder and more frequent as the winds increased. The Orca was in the distance, getting hit by the brunt of the storm. Waves crashed against the bow of the ship as it powered through the increasingly white-capped sea. This would make the chopper’s landing on the ship that much more interesting.

“Looks like she’s pitching about 15 degrees to either side. Hang on,” Nick warned as he brought the aircraft back down onto the deck. Setting the wheels on the pad brought a sense of relief to the entire crew. Nick wasn’t the worrying type, but this was a storm for the record books.