Original subtitles

(narrator): In the frigid Bering Sea...

...a fishing vessel is rocked by violent explosions.

- This cannot be happening.

- Man overboard! Man overboard!

- The explosion was enough force

to just throw you out of the vessel.

- Mayday, mayday, mayday!

Fire on board!

- When you're in that situation,

everyone has to ponder whether or not

burning alive is a better option

than dying of hypothermia in the water.

(dramatic music) - Jump! Jump!

- This is a really dangerous evacuation.

- Jump!

(narrator): A fireball nearly destroys

the Coast Guard rescue helicopter.

- Explosions just start. Boom, boom, boom.

(narrator): Investigators uncover a series of clues...

- This is really the story of a fast-occurring disaster.

(narrator): ...that led to catastrophe.

- Everybody on board that boat thought they were gonna die.

(painful grunts)

- It was intense.

(narrator): And changed nautical fire safety forever.

(theme music)

(tense music)

(birds squawking)

(narrator): The Bering Sea is one of the most

fertile fishing grounds in the world.

With frigid temperatures, rough seas

and frequent massive storms,

it's also one of the most treacherous.

But if you're brave enough to sail these waters,

you can make a fortune.

(rock music)

- I started commercial fishing in 1978.

I was 27 years old.

We fished crab up in the Bering Sea,

red king crab.

I enjoyed it and I decided that I want to maintain this

as an occupation and somewhere down the road,

I'd become a captain of a vessel.

(narrator): David Shoemaker was the captain

of cod fishing longliner, the Galaxy.

(Shoemaker): The Galaxy was one of the larger vessels

that I had had the opportunity of running.

She was 180 foot length overall

and was one of the biggest factory freezer longliners

to come into the industry at that time.

Longlining in the Bering Sea is really gear-specific.

We utilize a 3/8 inch ground line

with circle hooks attached every 32 inches for 11 miles.

That's a lot of gear.

We were running 65,000 hooks every 24 hours,

which meant that we had to run 24/7 until the vessel was full.

The Galaxy, because it would hold

1.5 million pounds of headed and gutted Pacific Grey Cod,

we could fill that up every 30 days.

(tense music)

One of the things that I was very grateful for

was the fact that my crew were seasoned veterans.

Chief engineer Raul Vielma was very good at what he did.

His function on the boat basically is

keep the mechanicals running.

The main engines, the auxiliaries,

hotel power, all of it.

My first mate, Jerry Stephens,

shared with me the responsibilities

of the wheelhouse.

My deck boss Ryan Newhall,

and I trusted him implicitly

with everything that took place on deck.

(De Nuccio): At the time, I was 21 years old,

so this was my third year fishing.

(narrator): Tory De Nuccio worked as a deck hand

aboard the Galaxy.

(De Nuccio): When you're starting out as a fisherman,

usually you're going to be setting and hauling the gear.

That's the main function of the deck hand

onboard the boat.

The crew of the Galaxy was a great crew.

Everyone was really professional onboard that boat.

(tense music)

(Shoemaker): It was a Sunday, October 20th in 2002.

We had just been in Dutch Harbor, Alaska,

five days prior to that.

We had made an offload and we were now re-provisioned

and fuelled up and headed back out

to go fishing again for another 30 days.

And we were heading up toward St. Matthews.

There was an area there that I fished quite frequently.

And we had committed with three different sets of gear,

all 11 miles apiece.

We had just finished up hauling the first 11-mile set.

Weather had come back up again,

which meant that it was getting a little bit unreasonable

to be hauling gear safely.

(De Nuccio): The weather was extremely foul,

probably about 20 foot seas with about 50 knots of wind.

(Shoemaker): And I said, "Button everything down,

close the hatches.

I want everything watertight."

And so I then made my turn

to head back up to the northwest.

I knew it was going to be rough. I knew it was going to be bad.

And so the vessel, it's rolling back and forth

20, 30 degrees.

- I was coming onto a shift, it was just about 1600 hours.

And so I was reporting to the 0-1 level of the Galaxy.

(dramatic beat)

- What took place at that point was we took a rogue wave,

if you will. (dramatic music)

It hit so hard...

...it just shook the whole boat.

(De Nuccio): Shortly after, I happened to look to my left.

I see a smoke pouring out.

At the time we saw the smoke,

there was no general alarm ringing,

but everyone defaulted

to the firefighting responsibilities

provided in the station bill.

(narrator): At the same time,

the factory foreman enters the bridge

to speak with the captain.

(Shoemaker): The process foreman walked in,

he had this very suspicious look on his face and he said,

"Captain, there is smoke in the factory."

(indistinct chatter)

I said, "What do you... what do you mean,

smoke in the factory?

What kind of smoke is in the factory?"

And he said, "Like behind you."

He said, "The smoke behind you."

And I turned around,

I saw the screw holes that held the angle irons

into that fiddley.

The smoke was corkscrewing out of those screw holes.

Every one of them.

(dramatic beat)

And when I saw that, I hit the general alarm.

(alarm blaring)

(narrator): Chief engineer Raul Vielma races

to the engine room to investigate,

only to find it filled with smoke.

(dramatic music)

(Shoemaker): There's all this activity going on,

the alarms are going off.

All of a sudden, I've got no lights,

I've got no electricity,

the emergency lighting system was trying to activate.

And I'm thinking, what's going on down below?

What happened? Where's my chief engineer?

(Chris Hearn): The chief engineer determined

that the best course of action at this point

was to trigger the CO2 system.

(narrator): Chris Hearn is a Master Mariner

and Director of the Centre for Marine Simulation

at Memorial University's Marin Institute.

- So on all large vessels like the Galaxy,

the engine room space is protected by a CO2 system.

It's essentially a smothering system

to extinguish a fire in an engine room space.

(alarm blaring)

A CO2 system release is authorized by the captain.

The chief engineer needed to contact the captain.

Attempting to do so by the phone proved to be unsuccessful

because the electrical system

had been knocked out by the fire.

(alarm blaring)

(fire crackling)

(Shoemaker): I had a hold of the single-side band radio...

(second alarm blaring)

Trying to make that radio call, that mayday call.

- Mayday! Mayday!

(Hearn): The captain's desperately trying

to make a mayday call,

but all the radios have been destroyed by the fire.

(alarm blaring)

(narrator): Many of the crew have evacuated to the upper deck

while other crew members attempt to battle the fire.

(coughs)

(De Nuccio): I was with first mate Jerry Stephens

and the deck boss, Ryan Newhall.

All three of us responded to fight the fire.

It's impossible. There's no way to fight it.

And it's not habitable in this space.

(gasps)

(coughs)

(Shoemaker): I'm on my own,

trying to make a mayday call

and the door kicked open and Raul came in,

and he had a mask on,

but he pulled it off and he said,

"I've gotta trigger to the fixed CO2 system in the engine room.

I've got to trigger it."

- We have to put this thing out!

(Hearn): The captain says, "Yes, go ahead."

The chief engineer has to run all the way back down

to the engine room,

to the local control to trigger the CO2,

but by then it was too late.

(dramatic beat)

(wind howls)

(narrator): As the fire rages,

crew members Jerry Stephens, Ryan Newhall

and Tory De Nuccio are trapped at the stern of the ship.

(De Nuccio): There's no going forward on the ship,

there's no going through the stairwells.

No one's going to make it through there.

Moving forward was not an option.

Getting air seemed to be the first human response.

We needed to breathe.

And the only way out now was out through the setting hatch.

(hinges creak)

(Shoemaker): And then, all of a sudden,

I heard this whooshing sound,

it was like the vacuum of opening a can.

Whoosh.

And no sooner that I heard that sound,

I felt the compression of the air in the wheelhouse,

it was like a lot of pressure.

Whoo.

What in the world was that?

And the vessel rocked really hard.

What could that possibly be?

(dramatic music)

And then all of a sudden I'm hearing people screaming.

- Man overboard! - What?

- Man overboard!

(Shoemaker): And I'm going, "Man overboard?"

This cannot be happening.

In the Bering Sea, aboard fishing vessel the Galaxy,

a fire burns out of control.

(coughing)

First mate, Jerry Stephens,

deck boss, Ryan Newhall,

and deck hand Tory De Nuccio are near an open hatch at the stern,

trying to escape the smoke.

(De Nuccio): As we're getting air,

simultaneously sizing up our situation

while looking outside,

'cause it's the only means of escape we now have,

it was just seconds,

and that's when the explosion happened.

(dramatic music)

The explosion was just a semi-truck of hot air,

enough force to just throw you out of the vessel.

And then, the sensation also hits you

when you hit the cold water,

kind of like the opposite, inverse effect.

And I look over and I see Jerry, and I see Ryan,

they're both swimming next to me.

And kind of the reality sets in,

I realize that we're just all three dead men.

(dramatic music)

(Hearn): For the crew of the Galaxy,

they're in a rapidly deteriorating situation.

They've started with a fire

that's now resulted in an explosion,

and now they've got a man overboard situation.

- Man overboard!

Man overboard!

Let's go!

(dramatic music continues)

(Shoemaker): I ran to the stern of the boat

and I see my three key individuals,

Tory De Nuccio, Ryan Newhall,

and Jerry Stephens, in the water.

- There's no way out of this,

and even if there's a way out of this,

we're looking, from our point of view,

at a ship that's on fire.

I can see the burn marks in the ship.

I can see burn marks through the ship

where the diesel fire has burned holes through the ship.

- Go get the buoy!

(crew yelling)

(Shoemaker): I'm screaming at these guys,

"Get stuff in the water, get the life rings,

get the buoys. Get them in the water!"

- Grab it!

(De Nuccio): The crew on the upper deck's response

was to, you know, throw some type of line

toward us that we could grab on to.

- Pull, pull!

(Shoemaker): We got Tory De Nuccio all the way up.

They drug him through the flames,

all the way up to the back, got him onto the deck.

He then collapsed on the deck.

(dramatic beat)

(Hearn): For the fire team members who've been

blown off the ship,

the crew managed to rescue two of them.

But the chief mate is injured

and he's unable to assist in his own rescue.

(crew yelling)

- Come on!

(Shoemaker): They had Jerry Stephens in a life ring.

They had him about halfway up the back of the boat,

he could no longer hold on.

(grunts)

(crew yelling)

- Help! Help!

(Shoemaker): And he slipped back into the water.

(narrator): Deck hand Calvin Paniptchuck puts on

a survival suit and jumps into the water

to rescue the chief mate.

(Shoemaker): He's put himself into harm's way,

going into 15, 20 foot seas

and swimming madly after Jerry Stephens.

Calvin was expending all possible energy

holding on to Jerry.

Then, all of a sudden, I...

I saw the foam...

coming out of his mouth.

And his eyes, his eyes just rolled back up, um...

And I knew at that point that he had passed.

But Calvin was still trying.

Calvin wouldn't give up.

(melancholic music)

So we started screaming at Calvin,

"It's over. Let him go, it's over."

(gentle music)

Now I've lost my first mate,

a very, very close friend of mine.

(narrator): Jerry Stephens slips away

from Calvin Paniptchuck

and is swept out to sea.

(sombre music)

(shoemaker): The shock of what just happened,

the crew, the fear in their eyes,

Jerry's passing,

everything that was coming just one right after another.

I had to regain control

because we were running out of time.

We're not going to make this, we're not going to survive it.

(Hearn): So the fire has destroyed

the main communication system for the ship, the radios,

but the ship does have emergency radios as a backup.

(Shoemaker): I remember turning around

and heading right straight back down

into that wheelhouse

to get to some working form of communication.

(coughs)

(groans)

Because I had not made a mayday call.

(coughs)

It was pitch black in the wheelhouse.

You could not see out the windows.

The chart table was on fire,

the carpets were on fire,

the walls were on fire.

(painful groan)

My hands were burning,

but I knew that I had three of these GMDSS radios

velcroed to the ceiling

behind the captain's chair on the bridge.

(coughing)

I fumble around. I feel it, I grab it.

(coughs)

I key it.

"Mayday, mayday, mayday,

this is the fishing vessel Galaxy,

we're in trouble,

I've got people in the water, over!"

And it was like there was a person standing next to me

in that wheelhouse and said,

"Galaxy, this is the Loran Sea Tower

on St. Paul Island.

Copy your transmission, what is your location?"

And I said, "We're 30 to 35 miles south

by southwest of St. Paul Island.

I gotta go. Over, I'm out."

(intriguing music)

(De Nuccio): Dave Shoemaker,

he came back and let us know that he had made a mayday call.

(narrator): At Coast Guard Air Station Kodiak,

the helicopter rescue crew receives word

of Galaxy's mayday call.

(Jason Quinn): Once we get airborne,

we understand that we're just going out to a vessel

that has a fire

and we don't have the bigger picture.

1(narrator): Coast Guard rescue swimmer Jason Quinn

is part of the search and rescue team

along with hoist operator Mike Simone,

pilot commander Melissa Rivera

and co-pilot Kendall Garran.

(Garran): When we found out about the Galaxy,

we had just landed maybe 15 minutes before

from about a four and a half hour safety patrol

in the Bering Sea.

That actually worked to our advantage

'cause we were still in our flight gear,

so we were able to get airborne that much quicker.

But it was at least a two-hour flight

to that vessel.

(Quinn): And I've actually responded to incidents

where it was like, "Oh, we had a fire,

but it was a false alarm,

we don't need your help anymore."

And I'm thinking, "They're going to get

this fire out before we even get there,

we have a two-hour flight to get there.

(propeller whirrs)

(narrator): Back onboard the Galaxy,

Captain Shoemaker prepares the crew

for a life raft evacuation.

- Prepare to abandon ship!

(De Nuccio): After Dave Shoemaker's made

a mayday call,

there's the attempt to try to get

preferably both rafts in the water.

The one on the port side, it's engulfed in smoke,

no one can touch it.

So the starboard side's the only option.

- Come on! - Go, go, watch the line!

(Shoemaker): We got the raft in the water.

Calvin Paniptchuck is still in the water

trying to get to the raft

that he now sees in front of him,

but he couldn't quite make it to the raft.

He needed help getting into the raft.

And that's when I saw Raul Vielma, my chief engineer,

leap over the side of the boat...

(splash) ...landed in the raft.

- Calvin! Calvin, I'm here!

(Shoemaker): Reached down and pulled Calvin

into the raft in one fell swoop.

(dramatic music)

(Hearn): The crew are now able to pull the life raft

into position so they can evacuate from the upper deck.

(Shoemaker): And it's not like, you know, stepping off

the side of the boat into a raft,

it's like coming out of a four-story building.

And you're like, "Oh, my god."

(Hearn): For the Galaxy's crew

that are collected up on the upper deck,

most of them don't have survival suits.

(narrator): The majority of the ship's survival suits are

either burned or inaccessible

to crew members trapped on the upper deck.

(Shoemaker): We had 45 survival suits

in the bosun's locker midship on the 0-1 weather deck.

I was up forward on the top of the house

screaming and hollering to try to get

some survival suits up from the lower deck up to us.

(narrator): The crewmen trapped on the lower deck

tie survival suits to a line

and toss it to Captain Shoemaker.

(De Nuccio): Captain Shoemaker was retrieving survival suits

from the front and getting them up.

Not a lot, but he was able to get one or two at a time.

(Shoemaker): When I got the suits,

I'm untying them on the deck,

George Karn, my cook, came up and he said...

- Captain, I can't swim.

- I said, "George?

This first suit's for you, George.'

- Take this!

(Shoemaker): I'm yelling at the guys

down on the decks down below,

"We need more suits, get more lines up here."

And I'm pulling hand over hand.

And as that happened, there was another explosion.

(dramatic music)

(De Nuccio): And then, Dave Shoemaker was gone.

(wind howling)

(narrator): In the Bering Sea, a raging fire has engulfed the Galaxy

and a violent explosion

has blown Captain David Shoemaker

from the upper deck. (thud)

- The captain actually falls all the way

to the lower deck

and it's amazing that he actually survived.

(Shoemaker): And I fell sideways down to the main deck

and I hit a crossover pipe

and I'm feeling this excruciating pain.

(painful groans)

I knew immediately that my ribs were broken.

And I remember hearing the sizzling sound

of my right arm, which was underneath me,

it was burning.

(pained grunts)

And then, I remembered my crew.

My crew's up on top,

and now I'm down on the 0-1 deck.

And if I had, for some reason, been able

to get into the interior,

I never would've made it to the top,

because the explosions were just ongoing.

(dramatic music)

And then I started thinking about fuel tanks

and oxygen acetylene tanks.

Huge, huge ammonia receivers.

This was like a floating bomb.

(grunts)

(Hearn): The captain is isolated and injured,

the chief mate has been lost over the side,

the chief engineer is down in the raft.

All the major decision makers have been removed

from the scenario.

It's a loss of control, and a loss of command,

and a loss of organization onboard the vessel.

And that's really shown by the panic that sets in.

- You got this, come on.

(De Nuccio): There's no escape route

to the forward part of the ship through the normal pathways,

that would be the stairwells,

because those are all engulfed in flames or smoke.

When you're in that situation,

everyone has to ponder whether or not...

burning alive slowly is...

is a better option than dying of hypothermia

in the water.

- Jump! Yes! Yeah!

(dramatic music)

(Hearn): This is a really dangerous evacuation.

The ship is on fire,

the hull is heating up,

so the life raft might actually start to melt

or burn as it lays alongside.

And more than that, it's nearly a four-storey jump

from the upper deck down to the life raft.

(yelling)

(De Nuccio): The chief engineer is yelling up

at the upper crew to get in the raft,

get in the raft.

But some people are not willing to jump.

- No, no, no, no... - That's okay.

(De Nuccio): Jumping three or four stories

and into a moving raft is something nobody wants to do.

One of the processors, Jose Rodas,

he decided to tie a line around himself

and lower himself down rather than jump.

(Hearn): Unfortunately, he became tangled up

and the rope actually had him pinned against the burning hull.

- And his body weight was causing the line

to choke his midsection. He was, uh...

he was being suffocated by the line.

He didn't speak English, he was yelling in Spanish

to cut the line.

So the line was cut and he fell into the water.

(Hearn): Unfortunately, he drifted away

and they weren't able to recover him

in the life raft.

(dramatic music)

(narrator): In the skies above the Bering Sea,

a Coast Guard helicopter races toward the Galaxy.

(Quinn): When it comes to responding to a rescue,

you actually never know

what you're really getting yourself into.

About 30 minutes into the flight,

I'm on the radio with COMMSTA Kodiak

and I asked him, "What's going on with the Galaxy?"

The radio came back and he said,

"They're fully engulfed in flames,

they're abandoning ship,

and there's possibly 26 people in the water."

Uh, I want to confirm, you said, two-six, 26?

"Confirmed, that's affirmative, 26 people in the water."

And then, at that moment, to me it was real.

(Garran): That becomes a logistic challenge.

We only have so much fuel,

we can't fit 26 people onboard at once.

That's going to be multiple trips.

We're far offshore and we're losing light.

And with the Galaxy on fire like that,

we didn't know if those people had time.

We have to take all of that into account.

How are we going to get this done?

- So when you start thinking about

an hour to an hour and a half until we can even get on scene,

can they survive that? Are they in a raft?

Who can we save?

And what's the best way to do it?

(narrator): On the Galaxy's burning upper deck,

three crewmen refuse to jump,

while 13 others have successfully made it

into the life raft.

(yells)

Deck hand Tory De Nuccio

and ship's cook George Karn are the last to jump.

(De Nuccio): I told him, "Watch the way that I jump

and just do exactly what I do."

And so I proceeded to jump.

It's at this time, the painter line is cut

by someone in the raft.

And so I jumped simultaneously as they're cutting this line.

And I wait for George to come right after me.

He was really hesitant to jump.

- Jump! Jump!

(De Nuccio): And then he jumped.

(yells)

And he hits the edge of the raft.

- George! - George!

(narrator): In the Bering Sea,

the Galaxy continues to burn

and a dangerous evacuation from the upper deck is underway.

Ship's cook George Karn is the last to jump.

- George! George!

(yells)

(De Nuccio): He jumps off and he hits the edge of the raft

and he bounces off.

There's an immediate attempt

to try to propel the raft toward him,

but it's just... it's just a futile effort.

(narrator): George Karn drifts away from the Galaxy.

(dramatic music)

Captain Shoemaker and the ship's assistant engineer are trapped

at the bow of the ship.

(Shoemaker): In my own mind,

I'm thinking about the boys on the back,

are they going to get to the raft.

And then all of a sudden, I'm hearing, you know,

this sound down below.

And I see the raft down below us and the raft is moving quick.

And I'm going like, "My God, the raft is...

the raft is right there!"

(tense music)

(gentle music)

I watched the raft as far as I could see

until it disappeared and I said to myself,

"Well, there is hoping everybody

that was on the stern of the boat was in the raft."

And once that raft went out of sight,

it became deathly quiet.

(melancholic music)

My assistant engineer, he just looked at me

and he said, "Captain, are we going to die today?"

And I said, "Yes, Mirek, we're going to die today."

And I knew that he was thinking

about his daughters and his wife.

I was thinking about my wife, my children.

Okay, we're saying goodbye.

It's time to pray.

We sat there for another five minutes, quiet.

And all of a sudden, Mirek jumped up.

"Captain, Captain!" He said, "There's lights!

There's lights on the horizon!"

(hopeful music)

- The Coast Guard had notified all vessels in the area

of the Galaxy situation

and three vessels actually mobilized to assist.

- Is there a chance that they can get

all the way down here to us before this vessel goes down?

And then all of a sudden, this C-130

comes popping out of the sky

and I'm going like, "Oh, here we go."

(narrator): A few minutes after the Coast Guard C-130 appears,

a Jayhawk rescue helicopter arrives on scene.

(Shoemaker): And when I saw the Jayhawk,

the Lone Rangers have shown up and I'm out of here.

(Garran): When we approached the fishing vessel Galaxy,

we could see that it was fully engulfed in flames.

We see men on the bow

and then there were three on the stern

where the fire was the worst.

(Quinn): The three guys that were on the stern of the vessel,

they were literally in sweatpants and sweatshirts.

They're not in survival suits.

What's the safest way to get these guys off

without putting them in further peril?

We were going to hoist the basket down

to the top of the ship.

They were going to get in one at a time

and we were just going to hoist them out.

This is the best available option.

But it's not like the three guys

on the stern of the vessel could move.

Like, they're on this very limited spot

that wasn't on fire.

(Garran): When we first made the approach

to the stern of the vessel,

which was being flown by me in the left seat,

which is highly unusual,

but in order to keep the aircraft nose

into the wind and make a safe approach,

we were doing things that were a little nonstandard.

(Quinn): The basket's going down

and I'm laying on the deck,

looking underneath the helicopter

as we were coming over the top.

- Explosions just started. Boom, boom, boom!

(Quinn): And all of a sudden, it was a big flare.

And I said, "Break right, break right, break right."

(narrator): The Galaxy is in danger of sinking

in the Bering Sea after being consumed by fire

and rocked by multiple explosions.

(dramatic music)

Now, a Coast Guard helicopter attempts a daring rescue

of the crew members still trapped on the ship.

(Garran): When we first made the approach

to the stern of the vessel,

we could hear the explosions and fire just shot up.

I broke right as quickly as I could

and that's when we determined we needed a different approach

to this rescue.

We wouldn't be able to do a direct hoist from the vessel.

It would put us in danger and it would put

people that we were trying to rescue in danger.

(Quinn): At that moment in time, the pilot said,

"We're not getting near that vessel again.

Jason, get your gear on.

You're going to go to the water."

(dramatic beat)

And my goal is to yell at the mariners

as loud as I can

to jump one at a time to the water to me.

I got lowered down to the water

and I remember watching the paint

uon the side of the vessel light on fire

and then fall into the water.

Damn, that's a hot fire.

I get close enough to the vessel, I look up,

and the first guy landed in the water

and I remember him coming up,

taking this big deep breath, and the water's freezing.

I grab him, told him, "I've got you,"

I jammed him into the basket, I gave a ready for pickup,

and he came out of the water. Cool.

He's saved, I need to go after the vessel.

(narrator): The two remaining crewmen jump into the water

and are hoisted into the Coast Guard helicopter.

(Quinn): They bring me up to the aircraft

and they said, "Okay, we're going to go

to the bow of the vessel, we have two people there."

(Shoemaker): When the Jayhawk came back around,

they nose down, and I'm looking

right at the pilot and the co-pilot.

I'm looking at these women and they're pointing at me

going like, "Okay, you come on."

(Garran): We put Jason Quinn, the rescue swimmer,

as close to the Galaxy as we could

without putting him in danger of being sucked under

because it was... it was rolling 25 to 30 degrees each way.

(Quinn): I'm swimming towards the vessel, but now,

every time the boat tips towards me,

the anchor disappears underwater.

My next thing is, like,

don't get smashed by the anchor.

(narrator): The Galaxy's assistant engineer

jumps into the water and gets hoisted into the helicopter.

- When it was my turn,

I went off the front and when I hit the water,

the pain shot through me

from my toes to the top of my head.

The next thing I know is this guy comes in

from behind me, grabs hold of me,

"I got you, buddy," and he squeezes my ribcage.

- And I remember hearing this howl like, "Oh!"

Oh, whoa, he's hurt.

- But at this point, he could have grabbed me

with two fingers in my nose

and dragged me wherever he wanted to. I'm going.

(Quinn): I remember turning around

and kicking up this wave

and I'm getting away from the vessel.

And I'm like, "Thank you, God, we... we're good, we're good."

Basket comes in the water.

I get Captain Shoemaker in the basket.

(dramatic music)

(Shoemaker): Going up in the basket,

I would never want to do that again.

It's quick, it's fast, and it...

nobody's playing games, so hold on.

(Garran): We received word

that one of the crewmen from the Galaxy was picked up

by one of the Good Samaritan vessels.

They relayed to us that he was non-responsive

with a very weak pulse.

- This is our last person that we can take

'cause then we've gotta go. We're out of fuel.

(dramatic music)

(narrator): Crewman Jose Rodas is hoisted

from the deck of the Clipper Express

into the helicopter.

(Shoemaker): Jose Rodas is laying there next to us,

they were doing chest compressions

and they're still working on him

to revive him and to bring him back.

(Quinn): We did CPR for about 30 minutes

until we landed back in St. Paul.

(sombre music)

As we're shutting down the aircraft,

the local people there,

they took over CPR and they, uh...

they pulled him out on a gurney.

They took him away. Um...

(narrator): Jose Rodas is rushed into the clinic,

but medics are unable to revive him.

(Garran): Although you land

and you're thrilled that between you

and the Good Samaritan vessels that helped you out,

we were able to rescue 23 of the 26.

It hurts that you couldn't rescue them all.

- I just can't even come close to expressing...

mentally, what every individual on the Galaxy

went through that day.

(sombre music continues)

(narrator): Three Galaxy crew members

lost their lives in the disaster.

The ship burned completely and sank.

(dramatic beat)

(tense music)

In the aftermath of the tragedy,

investigators want to know what happened,

how the fire spread so quickly,

and how they can prevent it from occurring again.

(Jason Neubauer): When you face an investigation

where there's a total loss of a vessel

in deep-water environments,

you're going to be basing a lot of the fact-finding

on witness testimony

and then any electronic data and evidence you can obtain.

(narrator): Jason Neubauer has been a U.S. Coast Guard

marine investigator for over 30 years.

- The primary focus of the investigation of Galaxy

was what caused the fire

and also the subsequent explosion.

For Galaxy, it was very difficult

to determine how the fire started

because the engine room was not required to be

attended at all times, not a continuous watch.

And the vessel was not required to have smoke detection

in the engine room.

(fire crackling)

So, it is not surprising that in this case,

there were multiple spaces filled with smoke

before anybody noticed that there was a fire.

(narrator): Using the time and location

where the smoke was first spotted,

Coast Guard investigators begin piecing together

how the fire started.

(Hearn): The best assumption that the Coast Guard can make

is that it's possible that a fuel leak

to the starboard generator may have been the cause.

It's important to remember,

shortly before the detection of smoke,

the vessel was struck by a large wave.

- Fuel lines sometimes will vibrate, uh, loose if you...

if a vessel took a large impact

and that released a large amount of fuel into the engine room

and caught fire.

- But the ship sank,

so the Coast Guard investigators don't have

their primary piece of evidence.

- It's impossible to tell at this point.

(narrator): The initial cause of the fire is undetermined,

so investigators shift focus to what factors may have led

to the fire spreading out of control.

(Neubauer): The fire on the Galaxy quickly disabled

the interior communication system.

So at that point, it became very difficult for the crew,

the master and the engineer, to communicate intentions

to try to put out the fire.

(narrator): This breakdown in communication led

to a critical delay triggering the emergency CO2 system.

- I have to trigger the CO2!

- A CO2 fire extinguishing system on a ship is designed

to take the oxygen away from a fire

and basically, suffocate the fire.

(narrator): Before the chief engineer could reach

the CO2 controls,

a massive explosion rocked the ship.

- So the chief engineer tried to trigger the CO2 system,

but he was knocked down by the explosion.

And by then, it might've already been too late

to be effective, anyway.

(sombre music)

(narrator): Investigators ask crew members

about what they observed in the moments

before the initial explosion.

(De Nuccio): So just before the explosion,

we're retreating for air. We can't breathe.

The only exit is going to be through the stern.

And there you'll find a setting hatch.

We had opened it to get some fresh air.

We needed to breathe, and this happened really quickly.

(coughs)

(Neubauer): As the crew was trying to escape,

there was witness testimony that they...

they heard kind of the whooshing of the air

going into the space.

(whooshing)

(De Nuccio): When that vacuum of air came through,

it was a really noticeable sound,

that something was pulling air.

(Hearn): Crew members on the Galaxy recount

this period right before the explosion

when the ship itself seemed to almost take a deep breath.

And this led the investigators to consider

that it very well might have been a backdraft.

(dramatic music)

(narrator): Coas to know

what triggered a massive explosion

aboard the Galaxy that led to its sinking

in the Bering Sea.

- One of the crew members recalled that there was

a rapid inflow of air and oxygen just ahead of the explosion.

(Shoemaker): I heard this whooshing sound.

Then, all of a sudden, this explosion.

(narrator): Investigators believe

the blast was the result of a phenomenon

known as a backdraft.

- A backdraft occurs when you have a smouldering fire

where there's a sudden introduction of oxygen

and it results in an explosion.

(Neubauer): Usually, there has been a buildup

of some kind of fuel or something in the air

that is atomized to a point where,

once you reintroduce the oxygen,

you get a very rapid explosion-type event.

(narrator): They're also able to piece together

the events that led to disaster.

(Hearn): When the alarm was sounded,

the chief engineer reports to the engine room.

He opens the doorway and he's met with thick smoke.

He attempts to call the bridge

to ask the captain to release the CO2 system.

But the communication system is down,

so he has to leave and go up to the bridge,

so the hatchway to the engine room is open.

(narrator): The open hatch meant the engine room fire was primed

for a backdraft.

All it needed was an oxygen source.

(Neubauer): Unfortunately,

as the crew was trying to escape,

they opened a hatch

and they heard kind of the whooshing of the air

going into the space.

Investigators feel that that was the primary source

of the major backdraft explosion event.

(dramatic music)

(Hearn): They had a fire that's resulted in an explosion

that has now also resulted in a man overboard situation.

(Neubauer): And at that point, it's going to be very difficult

to attack a fire that's already out of control.

(narrator): The Coast Guard makes several recommendations

to prevent similar tragedies from happening in the future.

(Hearn): The U.S. Coast Guard recommended

that smoke detectors should be present in engine room spaces

on vessels like the Galaxy.

(narrator): Investigators also address the failures

of the ship's internal communications

that meant the emergency CO2 was never deployed.

(Hearn): The chief engineer needed to contact the captain.

Attempting to do so by the phone proved to be unsuccessful.

So one of the recommendations from the Coast Guard is

to have a communication system that's independent

of the ship's electrical supply system.

- Galaxy shows, uh...

the importance of being internally vigilant at sea

and it reinforced the need for close monitoring

of your spaces,

but also being prepared for the worst.

- And in the process of this today,

we're going to do a fire onboard drill.

(Neubauer): Emergency response

and drilling is really important.

(narrator): After this life-changing tragedy,

Captain David Shoemaker dedicates his life

to training his fellow fisherman in nautical safety.

(Shoemaker): Since the incident on the Galaxy,

I've been honoured to be able to teach

safety classes at the North Pacific

Fishermen's Vessels and Owners Association.

The reason we're doing this today

is to go through and try to bring you

a little more current with some of the things

that are going to take place.

So we're going to try to make this

as realistic as we possibly can.

And they said, you know, "Basically, Dave,

if this can happen to the Galaxy,

this in fact can happen to anybody."

And I said, "You know, maybe...

maybe this is an opportunity for me to pay it forward,

in hopes that this would never happen to anybody else."

But more importantly, that if it did happen,

they would have some idea of what to do,

how to deal with it, how to cope and how to survive.

I've also been, uh,

the Seattle Fisherman's Memorial grief counsellor

for the past 12 years,

which has been actually a blessing to me.

Every year, on the first Sunday of every May,

we do the Seattle Fisherman's Memorial.

And I've been fortunate enough and granted the opportunity

to lead that ceremony.

(narrator): The Coast Guard took the rare step

of honouring members of the Galaxy crew

with awards for bravery.

- In this case, the Coast Guard determined

that the captain and the crew performed admirably

in trying to save as many lives as possible.

- My biggest takeaway from the incident is

everybody onboard that boat that day

thought they were going to die,

but there are more survivors

than there are people that perished in this incident.

So when it seems impossible,

it's not impossible. We... we walked away from it.

(Neubauer): For the crew members on the Galaxy,

under the conditions that they were facing,

it's incredible the amount of people survived.

It's a testament to their will to survive and their training.

(Shoemaker): If there's ever going to be a legacy behind me,

it's not going to be for anything that I did

on the Galaxy.

It's what I did after.

I know that our industry is safer

and I hope that that legacy will go on way beyond me.

That's what I can attribute to what took place on the Galaxy.

Subtitling: difuze