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–old folk prayer
In late December 1951, laden with passengers and nearly forty metric tons of cargo, the freighter S.S. Flying Enterprise steamed westward from Europe toward America. A few days into the voyage, she hit the eye of a ferocious storm. Force 12 winds tossed men about like playthings and turned drops of freezing Atlantic foam into icy missiles. When, in the space of twenty-eight hours, the ship was slammed by two rogue waves–solid walls of water more than sixty feet high–the impacts cracked the decks and hull almost down to the waterline, threw the vessel over on her side, and thrust all on board into terror.
Flying Enterprise’s captain, Kurt Carlsen, a seaman of rare ability and valor, mustered all hands to patch the cracks and then try to right the ship. When these efforts came to naught, he helped transfer, across waves forty feet high, the passengers and the entire crew to lifeboats sent from nearby ships. Then, for reasons both professional and intensely personal, and to the amazement of the world, Carlsen defied all requests and entreaties to abandon ship. Instead, for the next two weeks, he fought to bring Flying Enterprise and her cargo to port. His heroic endeavor became the world’s biggest news.
In a narrative as dramatic as the ocean’s fury, acclaimed bestselling author Frank Delaney tells, for the first time, the full story of this unmatched bravery and endurance at sea. We meet the devoted family whose well-being and safety impelled Carlsen to stay with his ship. And we read of Flying Enterprise’s buccaneering owner, the fearless and unorthodox Hans Isbrandtsen, who played a crucial role in Kurt Carlsen’s fate.
Drawing on historical documents and contemporary accounts and on exclusive interviews with Carlsen’s family, Delaney opens a window into the world of the merchant marine. With deep affection–and respect–for the weather and all that goes with it, he places us in the heart of the storm, a “biblical tempest” of unimaginable power. He illuminates the bravery and ingenuity of Carlsen and the extraordinary courage that the thirty-seven-year-old captain inspired in his stalwart crew. This is a gripping, absorbing narrative that highlights one man’s outstanding fortitude and heroic sense of duty.
“One of the great sea stories of the twentieth century… [a] surefire nautical crowd-pleaser.”
—Booklist é (starred review)
“Frank Delaney has written a completely absorbing, thrilling and inspirational account of a disaster at sea that occasioned heroism of the first order. In the hands of a gifted storyteller,
the ‘simple courage’ of the ship’s captain and the young radio man who risked their lives to bring a mortally wounded ship to port reveals the essence and power of all true courage–
a stubborn devotion to the things we love.”
–Senator John McCain
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Creators
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Publisher
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Release date
June 27, 2006 -
Formats
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Kindle Book
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OverDrive Read
- ISBN: 9781588365316
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EPUB ebook
- ISBN: 9781588365316
- File size: 1795 KB
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Accessibility
No publisher statement provided -
Languages
- English
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Reviews
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May 15, 2006
Crippled by two monstrous waves during a 1951 North Atlantic hurricane, the freighter Flying Enterprise
was left wallowing on its side and looking as if it would sink at any minute. The subsequent rescue, in mountainous seas, of 10 passengers and 40 crew by lifeboats from responding ships was indeed harrowing—and it's over by page 92 of this overblown maritime-distress yarn. The rest of the book is about the Enterprise
's captain, Kurt Carlsen, who insisted on staying aboard to await a tugboat to tow the floundering ship to harbor. Carlsen certainly went beyond the call of duty, but heroism is measured by the stakes involved, which in this case were neither lives nor justice but merely the ship owner's investment. Delaney embellishes the tale with glances at Carlsen's family's anxiety, soggy reminiscences of his own family following the story on the radio and fulsome tributes to the Danish skipper's flinty Nordic resolve (which are rather undercut by the knowledge that Carlsen could have transferred at any time to one of the ships babysitting the hulk). Carlsen's story generated a lot of breathless press hoopla at the time, and it still has the feel of a trumped-up media sensation. Photos not seen by PW
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Starred review from June 1, 2006
Best-selling popular historian Delaney (" Ireland," 2005) turns his attention to one of the great sea stories of the twentieth century, that of Captain Kurt Carlsen and the " Flying Enterprise." On Christmas Day 1951, the World War II Liberty ship" Flying Enterprise" began splitting apart in a North Atlantic gale, and her cargo of pig iron shifted. Captain Carlsen saw to the safe abandonment of passengers and crew, then remained aboard to help with salvage efforts. He remained aboard, accompanied only by a young radioman who leaped aboard from a rescue ship, until the " Flying Enterprise" was about to sink under him. Although he may not have displayed the most flawless seamanship in the loading of the pig iron, a worldwide media blitz made him an international hero. It is possible that he was guarding some secret, valuable cargo, and recent dives have revealed that some portion of the wreck had been removed in the interim. Any secret remains unproven, and Delaney's digression to compare Carlsen with his father seems rather unnecessary; yet this remains a tale certain to enthrall anyone interested in those who go down to the sea in ships. Indeed, it may be the most surefire nautical crowd-pleaser since Gary Kinder's " Ship of Gold in the Deep Blue Sea" (1998). (Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2006, American Library Association.)
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