MS Prinsendam, a Holland-America liner built at Shipyard de Merwede in the Netherlands

Netherlands

The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...

 in 1973, was 427 feet long and typically carried about 350 passengers and 200 crew members. The liner was sailing through the Gulf of Alaska

Gulf of Alaska

The Gulf of Alaska is an arm of the Pacific Ocean defined by the curve of the southern coast of Alaska, stretching from the Alaska Peninsula and Kodiak Island in the west to the Alexander Archipelago in the east, where Glacier Bay and the Inside Passage are found.The entire shoreline of the Gulf is...

, approximately 120 miles south of Yakutat, Alaska, at midnight on October 4, 1980, when a fire broke out in the engine room. The vessel’s master, Cornelis Dirk Wabeke (April 13th 1928 - August 16th 2011), declared the fire out of control one hour later and the Prinsendam sent a radio call requesting immediate assistance. The United States Coast Guard

United States Coast Guard

The United States Coast Guard is a branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven U.S. uniformed services. The Coast Guard is a maritime, military, multi-mission service unique among the military branches for having a maritime law enforcement mission and a federal regulatory agency...

 at Communications Station Kodiak, Alaska

Kodiak, Alaska

Kodiak is one of 7 communities and the main city on Kodiak Island, Kodiak Island Borough, in the U.S. state of Alaska. All commercial transportation between the entire island and the outside world goes through this city either via ferryboat or airline...

 requested that the MS Prinsendam send out an SOS

SOS

SOS is the commonly used description for the international Morse code distress signal...

, but the captain declined. Chief Radio Officer Jack van der Zee sent one out anyway about a half hour later, which alerted nearby vessels.

As the ship's location was out of range of United States Coast Guard helicopters, USAF

United States Air Force

The United States Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the American uniformed services. Initially part of the United States Army, the USAF was formed as a separate branch of the military on September 18, 1947 under the National Security Act of...

 Air Rescue Service

Air Rescue Service

The Air Rescue Service is a disestablished organization in the United States Air Force. Previously a subcommand of the Military Air Transport Service , a USAF major command , ARS was redesignated as the Aerospace Rescue and Recovery Service on 1 Jan 1966 when MATS was redesignated as the Military...

 helicopters (which have a longer range and can be aerially refueled) airlifted medical officers and pararescue men to the ship and evacuated the injured from the fire prior to other ships reaching the scene to evacuate the passengers and crew.

United States Coast Guard and Canadian Coast Guard

Canadian Coast Guard

The Canadian Coast Guard is the coast guard of Canada. It is a federal agency responsible for providing maritime search and rescue , aids to navigation, marine pollution response, marine radio, and icebreaking...

 helicopters and the cutters , , and responded in concert with other vessels in the area. The passenger vessel later capsized and sank. The rescue is particularly important because of the distance traveled by the rescuers, the coordination of independent organizations, and the fact that all 520 passengers and crew were rescued without loss of life or serious injury.

External links

• James Kelly, "A Morning to Remember", Time
  Time (magazine)
  Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
  
  , October 20, 1980.