The Tribune

Listing heavily, taking on water and out of power, there was no saving the battered US freighter from the ravages of Hurricane Joaquin. Using recordings from the ship’s recovered ‘black box’, Jason Dearen pieces together the harrowing moments before all hands were lost off Crooked Island in 2015 . . .

Standing with Captain Michael Davidson on the bridge of the El Faro, chief mate Steve Shultz noted the barometer readings were heading downward, which could indicate they were closer to Joaquin’s eye. That ran counter to the storm track models Davidson had used - those showed the hurricane farther away. He still planned to outrun it.

“We won’t be goin’ through the eye,” the captain said: if they could skirt a bit further south, away from the eye toward Crooked Island, they would reach its back side more quickly.

With the ship tilting and oil pressure decreasing, the captain decided to use the wind to force the ship more upright. If he could do that, he could get oil pressure back, and increase the ship’s power. “Just steer that heading right there the best you can. That’ll work for us,” the captain instructed Frank Hamm, the helmsman, and Shultz.

The ship dropped down a three-storey-tall swell. “Feel the pressure droppin’ in your ears just then? Feel that?” Davidson said, trying to make light of the situation.

Hamm’s large frame was bent over in fear at his console. Two days earlier, the 49-year-old father of five had called Rochelle, his wife, just before he sailed out of range. He said everything was OK - Hamm liked and trusted the captain, with whom he had often worked. But in the chaos of the storm, he had been unable to send his customary daily email home.

“Take your time and relax,” Davidson said. Hamm managed to find his breath, then took the helm back. “I am relaxed, Captain.”

Davidson turned quickly to the ship’s computer. He needed to check the Bon Voyage System (BVS), an online subscription weather forecasting tool, to get the latest hard data on Joaquin. “Hanging in there (Frank)?” Shultz said, trying to keep the jittery helmsman engaged as the captain scanned his email for the weather updates. “Still got us on course. You’re doin’ great.”

The captain grew confused. Though the forecasting tool told him the storm was still farther north, clearly they were right in it. “We’re gettin’ conflicting reports as to where the centre of the storm is,” he said.

Davidson did not know that there was a problem with the BVS system emails he was receiving: one update he had received had storm tracking information that was 21 hours old. While he had access to other forecasts on the internet, Davidson relied on BVS. The storm they now faced was far more advanced than his weather models showed.

“Our biggest enemy here right now is we can’t see,” he said. He believed they were nearing the back side of the storm, but had no way of knowing for sure. By overruling his crew’s suggested alternate routes, he had made a horrible mistake. An engineer from below deck appeared on the bridge. Something wasn’t right. “I’ve never seen it list like this,” the engineer reported. The El Faro’s steep list was not just from sliding shipping containers, the engineer reasoned - something else was to blame.

The phone rang with a call from the engine room. The ship was losing oil pressure, and needed to be righted now.

“I’m tryin’ to get her steadied up,” the captain replied.

Water surged over the ship’s stern, and the sound of the ocean pounding the old ship was deafening. Another electric ring of the telephone. Davidson answered, “Bridge, captain.” A moment passed and he turned to his chief mate: “We got a prrroooblem.”

Water had started flooding one of the ship’s warehouse-sized holds used to store cars and other large containers. He ordered Shultz, a 54-year-old former Navy captain and seasoned mariner, below deck immediately to start pumping out the hold. It was a perilous assignment. Any piece of heavy cargo afloat in the hold could easily pulverise Shultz. The chief mate grabbed a walkie-talkie and climbed down from the bridge.

The captain took the ship’s helm from Hamm. With water flooding into the El Faro’s insides, he knew why he had been unable to right the ship. He turned the steering wheel hard, trying to use the wind again - anything to decrease the ship’s angle. Shultz radioed from below in the flooded cargo chamber.

“About knee deep in here,” he said.

Lost propulsion

At 6am, Danielle Randolph came back to the bridge from her stateroom. She had changed out of her work clothes and had not changed back before coming up.

She moved over to the dead radar screen - which had gone dark, maybe from water coming through a gap in one of the bridge’s windows - to try and get the ship’s current position. After a few minutes, the radar fluttered and suddenly blinked back to life. “All right, good,” the captain said. He ordered Randolph to sync the latest BVS weather models with their current position, still not realising the data was hours old, and useless.

The ship groaned over yet another tall wave. “Nooooo,” Randolph said, bracing. “There goes the lawn furniture.”

“Let’s hope that’s all,” said the captain.

Randolph was not supposed to be on the bridge, but Davidson didn’t question her. “You want me to stay with you?” Randolph asked. “Please,” the captain said. “It’s just the ...” He couldn’t finish his sentence.

Shultz called from the flooded hold again. He wanted the bridge to move the ship so the water below would shift to the other side.

All at once, a terrifying silence gripped them. The rumble and vibration of ship’s engines ceased. The El Faro was adrift.

“I think we just lost the plant,” Davidson said. Somehow, he needed to balance the ship, an almost impossible feat without propulsion.

Down below, the whirring pumps continued to push thousands of gallons a minute from the flooded holds. Up top, everyone had to use their leg muscles to stay standing on the angling ship. “Feeling those thighs burn?” Randolph asked Hamm, as he dug in to turn the rudder.

Just after 7am, Davidson picked up the ship’s emergency satellite phone. He dialled the cellphone number of TOTE’s designated person ashore, the only human in charge of knowing what was going on with the fleet. The call went to voicemail.

Davidson rattled out a brief message, then called the company’s answering service. A woman picked up with a pleasant hello.

“We had a hull breach; a scuttle blew open during a storm,” Davidson explained tersely. “We have water down in three hold, with a heavy list. We’ve lost the main propulsion unit, the engineers cannot get it going.” He asked for her to patch him through to a TOTE official immediately.

“Can you please give me your satellite phone number and spell the name of the vessel?” she asked slowly. “Spell your name, please?”

TOTE safety officials had identified the answering service as a problem previously, but it had not been fixed.

“The clock is ticking” the captain said, his voice calm despite the chaos. He tried again. “This is a marine emergency, and I am tryin’ to also notify management!” He gave the operator his name and number and hung up.

Electronic alarms echoed throughout the steel freighter. Randolph read out their current position. The captain called down to the flooding hold. “Can you tell if it’s decreasing or increasing?” he asked. “I can’t tell captain. Seems as if it’s goin’ down,” the chief mate replied. He turned to Randolph. “Say second mate. How ‘bout our range and bearing from like San Miguel Island? Or San Salvador? Whatever that island is there,” he said, looking for any sign of land they might be able to reach. He grabbed the El Faro’s emergency beacon that would aid rescuers in finding their position.

The satellite phone rang; it was his boss. “Yeah, I’m real good,” Davidson said matter-of-factly. “Three hold’s got considerable amount of water in it. Uh, we have a very, very healthy port list. The engineers cannot get lube oil pressure on the plant, therefore we’ve got no main engine. And let me give you, um, a latitude and longitude. I just wanted to give you a heads up before I push that, push that button,” he said, referring to the Ship Security Alert System (SSAS), an emergency beacon. It was 7.07am.

“The crew is safe,” he said into the phone. “Right now we’re tryin’ to save the ship. But it’s not gettin’ any better. No one’s panicking. Our safest bet is to stay with the ship during this particular time. The weather is ferocious out here.” Davidson told his boss it was time to alert the Coast Guard. “I wanna wake everybody up,” he said. “I just wanted to give you that courtesy, so you wouldn’t be blindsided by it. Everybody’s safe right now, we’re in survival mode.”

Terrified helmsman

Randolph stood at the ready. “All right now, push the SSAS button,” he commanded.

“Roger,” she said.

“Wake everybody up. Wake ‘em up!” Davidson shouted. “We’re gonna be good. We’re gonna make it right here.”

Chief Mate Shultz radioed from the flooded hold again. “I think the water level’s rising captain,” he said. He could think of nothing more to do.

“All right, chief,” the captain replied.

Davidson’s tinny voice sounded over the ship’s intercom ordering the crew to muster. He wanted everyone accounted for. The high-frequency bell of the abandon ship alarm rang out.

“Can I get my vest?” Randolph asked.

“Yup, bring mine up too and bring one for (Frank)” the captain replied. The helmsman, a large man and diabetic, yelled out as Randolph left the bridge: “I need two!”

“OK buddy, relax,” the captain said. The ship heaved, the tip of its bow sinking beneath the black water.

“Bow is down. Bow is down,” Davidson said over the ship intercom.

“Get into your rafts. Throw all your rafts in the water,” he yelled. “Everybody. Everybody get off the ship! Stay together!” he screamed.

Hamm was unable to move. “Cap, Cap,” he said.

“You gotta get up,” Davidson ordered. “You gotta snap out of it and we gotta get out!” he said, his voice firm, urgent.

“Help me!” Hamm pleaded.

“Ya gotta get to safety!” the captain yelped. Hamm couldn’t move.

The shrill beat of alarms continued as the ship’s tilt worsened.

The captain reached for Hamm. “Don’t panic. Don’t panic,” he said. “Work your way up here. Don’t freeze up! Follow me,” he pleaded with Hamm.

“I can’t! My feet are slipping! I’m goin’ down!

Davidson looked at his terrified helmsman. “You’re not goin’ down. Come on!” he yelled.

“You gonna leave me,” Hamm cried.

“I’m not leavin’ you. Let’s go,” the captain responded.

“I’m a goner!” Hamm screamed.

“No, you’re not!” the captain replied.

The El Faro’s bridge reared up as the ship sank deeper.

“It’s time to come this way!” Davidson shouted, as the El Faro slipped beneath the sea.

No bodies recovered

It would be months before search crews found the wreckage. The El Faro had come to rest 15,000 feet down, on the seafloor near The Bahamas. The bridge where Hamm and Davidson struggled for survival had separated from the vessel’s hull, and lay a quarter of a mile away.

No bodies were ever recovered. It was the worst maritime disaster for a US-flagged vessel since 1983.

The US Coast Guard has held six weeks of investigative hearings over the past year, and the National Transportation Safety Board is conducting its own probe. Both agencies are expected to issue findings later this year.

TOTE defended its safety record, and emphasised that the El Faro was permitted to operate by the Coast Guard despite the issues flagged by inspectors. The company also said it had been working on fixing the problems with its emergency answering service, but had not got to it before El Faro’s voyage. It now is paying for a more expensive storm forecasting tool for its entire fleet.

In December, 2015, about two months after the El Faro sank, a couple picking up trash on Ormond Beach in Florida found a green hard hat among the plastic bottles and other garbage. The name “Frank” was scrawled in Hamm’s writing across the front.

Rochelle Hamm recognised it immediately as her husband’s. It’s encrusted with sand and bits of dried seaweed. She keeps it in a bag by the side of her bed.

• Jason Dearen is a Florida-based reporter with the Associated Press