ALL THE MEN IN THE SEA: The Untold Story of One of the Greatest Rescues in History

Journalist Krieger tells the thrilling story of the disaster that befell pipelaying divers and attendant seamen aboard barge 269 during a hurricane. Floating 60 miles off the coast of Yucatan Peninsula, 269 was moored to two tugboats in October 1995 when Hurricane Roxanne moved in, spiraled away and spun back with 90-mile-an-hour winds and waves nearly 45 feet high. Krieger chronicles how bad judgment and worse luck put hundreds of men in harm's way and ultimately cost eight lives. (A passage depicting divers in need of accelerated decompression before the storm hits is particularly nerve-racking.) He also pauses to succinctly explain the mechanics of a tempest, what happens when someone gets the bends and the socioeconomic disparities of the Mexican and American shipmates. As if the specter of drowning were not enough, 269 explodes, with thrashing tanks and deluged generators popping like fireworks, leaking oil, which sickens those who struggle to stay afloat until help arrives. In the second part of the book, Krieger examines the similarly unsettling suit brought against the Mexican–U.S. company that owned the barge by various parties who are still plagued by choking memories of a debacle so viscerally recaptured. (Oct.)