The Perfect Storm

In the 1940s, the U.S. Navy ran a series of wave tests that found a ship could either pitch-pole, which is being flipped end over end by steep waves, or founder, which is being inundated by successive waves until it goes under. Junger says either could have happened to the Andrea Gail, that the seas are violent and high enough for both. Junger recounts the story of Ernie Hazard, who went over on Georges Bank in 1982. When the ship rolled, Hazard found himself in a pocket of air, the ship upside down above him. He managed to gain his bearings and swim free. Most people do not; instead, they drown. Junger recounts the story of James Lowson, whose ship went down in 1892, en route to Sri Lanka. Lowson underwent a laryngospasm—his throat involuntarily closed up, and he “drowned” with no water in his lungs. He blacked out, but came to some time later and washed ashore. Junger outlines what happens to the body when faced with drowning, how involuntary reflexes take over. He says cold water sometimes will keep a person alive, but, always, if left long enough without oxygen, the body shuts down and dies, which is what must have happened to all six members of the Andrea Gail, after the ship eithers founders or pitch-poles.