Rescue of the Tall Ship Bounty in Superstorm Sandy    NEW!

The tall ship Bounty, featured in the Marlon Brando movie Mutiny on the Bounty, sank during Superstorm Sandy in 2012.  The captain and a crewmember perished in the accident but the Coast Guard performed harrowing helicopter rescues to save the other fourteen sailors.  Tougias will use slides of the storm, the survivors, and the rescue to make this “an edge-of-your seat” visual program.   
    The story begins on October 25, 2012 when Captain Robin Walbridge made the fateful decision to sail the HMS Bounty from New London, Connecticut to St. Petersburg, Florida.  Walbridge was well aware that a hurricane was forecast to come up the Eastern seaboard.  He explained to his crew of 15 that the ship would fare better at sea than at port, and that he thought he could sail “around the hurricane.”  He told the crew that anyone who did not want to come on the voyage could leave the ship and there would be no hard feelings.  No one took the captain up on his offer, and this decision would have fatal consequences. 
    Four days into the voyage Superstorm Sandy made an almost direct hit on the Bounty. The captain issued a Mayday explaining that the vessel’s pumps could not keep up with the incoming water.  A few hours later, in the dark of night, the vessel suddenly heeled over, sending the crew tumbling into the ocean filled with crashing thirty foot waves.  Some were swept far from the ship, others found themselves tangled in the rigging, while others were trapped below the surface by the masts and spreaders.  
    “I enjoy doing these programs,” says Tougias, “because I like to transport the audience into the heart of the storm so that they ask themselves ‘what would I have done.’  It’s like watching a movie with the author giving behind the scene details.” Tougias says that besides focusing on the voyage and the disaster he will recount the heroic rescue attempts by Coast Guard rescue swimmers and pilots. (Rescue of the Bounty is dedicated to librarians, and Tougias acknowledges that “our libraries are national treasures.)
The instructor will be teaching from a remote location.