The Finest Hours by Michael J. Tougias Page A

was wait for dawn and hope that the cutter Yakutat , which was standing by, would somehow get them off before they went down with the ship.
    Captain Naab had spent a sleepless night on the Yakutat , staring at the huge black hulk of the Mercer and praying it would stay afloat until dawn. And so when the captain saw the first hint of light to the east, he was relieved. He was also thankful that the snow and sleet had let up. The wind was still howling, but the seas seemed to have eased a bit, dropping from the 50- and 60-foot range to about 40 feet. Now Naab went over his options. After what had transpired the preceding night, he did not want to send over more life rafts. He was afraid that if the survivors fell into the frigid ocean, they simply would not have the strength or the dexterity to stay afloat or climb into the rafts. Naab knew that the only way the men could be saved was if some of his own crewmen were waiting for them. He then made a fateful decision. The cutter’s 26-foot lifeboat would be launched with a crew of five. It was a gamble to be sure; now Naab had to worry not only about the survival of the tanker’s crewmen but about his own men who might be lost as well.
    The skipper also feared that the men left on the Mercer ’s bow might, upon seeing a lifeboat coming their way, jump too soon. He picked up a loudspeaker and shouted to the survivors that he was sending over a lifeboat and that the lifeboat crew would signal to them when it was time to jump. He told the survivors that when the time came, they should jump into the ocean next to the lifeboat, and his men would pull them up. Naab knew that if this rescue failed, he would be second-guessed and the deaths of the men would forever haunt him. But, looking out at the bow, he thought the half ship was in danger of capsizing at any time. He could not afford to wait a moment longer.
    The lifeboat was referred to as a “Monomoy surfboat” because it was designed with a high bow for the big surf that crashed into Monomoy Island, just off Chatham. But the 40-foot seas swirling around the Yakutat might be more than the wooden lifeboat was capable of handling. If the lifeboat capsized, the crew on board would have fewer than ten minutes of consciousness before hypothermia snuffed them out.
    Ensign William Kiely, of Long Branch, New Jersey, was selected to lead the daring rescue, and he would be joined by Gil Carmichael, Paul Black, Edward Mason Jr., and Walter Terwilliger. One of the most dangerous parts of the mission would be at the very beginning: the lifeboat had to clear away from the Yakutat before waves slammed her back into the cutter and swamped her.
    Carmichael later remembered how he and his fellow crewmen nervously boarded the lifeboat, and the men on board the cutter began lowering them with block, tackle, and winch. “The seas were so rough that the launch swung away from the ship and then slammed back into it. We didn’t realize it at the time, but I think that cracked the wooden side of the boat. When we set down on the water, that’s when I fully realized how small our launch was compared to the seas, and I had my doubts whether or not I’d ever get on the cutter alive again.”
    The four coasties navigated the lifeboat through the giant swells and pulled up alongside the massive steel hull of the Mercer , careful not to get too close.
    Inside the broken bow of the Mercer , an argument broke out about who would jump first. Captain Paetzel said he wanted to be the last to leave, but his men felt that because of the deteriorating condition of his feet and the weakness he was showing from hypothermia, he should be the first to go. None of the men knew if the tiny lifeboat would be able to handle all four of them, nor did they know if the men in the launch were really going to be able to pluck them out of the seas. But they all felt it was a chance they’d have to take: if they stayed on board and the ship