Live To Tell: Black Wave

A Shipwreck On The High Seas Forces A Mother To Make An Unthinkable Choice

(CBS)  John Silverwood: I'd lost almost ¾ of my blood. I was in shock; my kidneys were gone and the rest of my organs were shutting down. The pain was unbearable. I knew I was dying.

Jean Silverwood: And I stood there and thought, "I’m gonna keep trying. We have to get this life raft off or John’s gonna die on this boat."

Amelia Silverwood: My mom is trying to get the life raft out because we couldn’t carry my dad just with our bare hands.

John: She’s in a frenzy. She’s determined to get this life raft out -- nothing will stop her.

Jean: I put my arms up on top of the railing of the boat and I just pushed and pushed and pushed with all my strength and I used every bit of effort that I could possibly use to try to get this life raft out and I couldn’t do it.

John: She battles there for like half an hour. You know, she winds up cutting her legs on the stainless steel and everything else.

Jean: And then, just… it took sheer will, but I went back again.

John: And Ben finally comes out there with a hack saw blade he found and he is sawing through stainless steel and Jean frees this raft. And she gets the raft to the last corner of the boat where I’m marooned and the last thing I ever did was help them to slide me into that life raft.

Amelia: So we get the life raft. And we put my dad in it.

John: And they surf the life raft in up over the coral and get it into a tide pool, and then my daughter, Amelia, holds that life raft. She’s in water up to her chest and she holds that life raft from these razor-sharp edges of the tide pool, and my wife puts both of the little kids in next to me. Jean slides in next to me because I’m shivering, I’m like out of control, my teeth are chattering and they wanna try to keep me warm, they’re doing anything they can to keep me warm.

Amelia: When I was holding the life raft in the water, my mom is meanwhile pouring bloody cups of water out right beside me. I can hear these fish flapping in the water everywhere… I keep telling myself, I’m like "Oh well, I should be thinking about my dad. He’s about to die you know." But at the same time, I’m like, "I am in the South Pacific. I am in the water… there could be sharks here."

Ben Silverwood: It was early, early morning, like pre-dawn. The sky was like a little bit pink and I saw this little kind of a star, but it was moving around on the horizon.

Jean: And then Ben screamed, "It's a plane! It's a plane!"

John: Ben takes the last of our big flares and he fires that flare.

Jean: And the plane just circled over and over us. I can't even describe the feeling of elation that came over me, because 5 minutes earlier, I was thinking of leaving John here to die and taking my kids to help us survive.

John: Ben’s screaming, the kids are screaming. I can see Ben and his face came up over me… and he’s got this big smile and he says, "Dad, we’re gonna get you out of here man. They’re coming."

Ernie Delli Gatti: The jet arrived on scene and we received the phone call here. The information was piecemeal at best. All the information they provided us was that they did find six Americans that were alive, and that one had sustained an injury. To what extent we did not know. Unfortunately, they were unable to land.

Ben: The plane flew around in circles, just around us, and I was kind of just thinking, "What’s it doing, flying around in circles like that?"

John: What my wife and Ben and the kids couldn’t know was that over the horizon, further than we could see, there was a little island.

The French search plane was trying to get a mom and dad and their 14 kids -- this family that lived there with no electricity, no running water, they were just subsistence fishermen -- to come and rescue us. But they were just waving up in the sky saying, you know, "Hi, great to see you."

And the French crew came up with a brilliant idea. They wrote message on a piece of paper and they rolled it up and they shoved it in a soda bottle and put a top on it. They flew down low and slow and right in front of their little hut on stilts where they live and they splashed the that bottle in the ocean there.

Jean: But then like three hours passed and there’s still no helicopter.

Ernie Delli Gatti: Unfortunately it was gonna take another couple hours before the helicopter arrived on scene. Simply because they had to island hop and get gas at one of the other islands before they were able to proceed where the sailing vessel Emerald Jane was located.

[dixxson]

These kind of adventures are good for adults, but Kid?
The Ohio river froze once and officials could not keep people off the ice!
They took their Kids! And often fell through. Had to be rescued!
A Lady reported on the internet yesterday, that her 9 yr old boy had asked to ride
the subway alone. She Let Him! And Rationalized Her decision to the Media!
To me All these kind of people are as "LOONY as the "QUINTUPLET MOM".

[mavrik36able]

look, when i was 15 we went white water rafting on class 5+ rapids in west virgina. was i scared? yes did i want to do it? YES! there are people out there that are actually intrested in living life to the fullest thats what these people were doing and having talked to the family i know the children were glad to have gone sailing, if not glad to have had the accident

[maria391-2009]

Good grief--what a pathetic family!! They brought this on themselves--and as to the wife's dredging up the husband's decades old drinking problem? It made me dislike his family more (just when I though *that* wasn't possible).

I don't get the comments supporting this irresponsible family. They got everything they deserved.

[b41hxs]

Like many other posters I found the title hysterical. Like a 70s flashback. ?Coming soon to a theater near you, Irwin Allens BLACK WAVE starring Charlton Heston as Dad??.

As for the few fools who actually are supporting this arrogant narcissist and his shrieking blond trophy wife and damming everyone for being cowards and lumps for not having the guts to ?follow their dreams? (values that differ from our own??? Try sheer stupidity) let me set you straight about a few things:

The only reason that rich jerks like this do things like that is so they can send out Christmas cards to everyone they know that read along the lines of ?Toodles everyone. Hope you are all having a great holiday with your boring, mundane lives. We on the other hand are sailing up the Rivera in our BRAND NEW YACHT. Muffin and the kids are dissecting a giant squid we just caught and they should all have their PhDs in Marine Biology by the end of the month. Bye!?

This idiot man-child uprooted his children, tore them away from their lives and endangered them because he can never possibly be wrong about anything on any subject. Most people who are successful in one area suddenly think they are an expert on everything including seamanship like old pops pegleg. Once he realized what he had gotten himself into he decided to admit his mistake only to his buddy Jack Daniels who was the sixth passenger on the S.S. Minnow. I also cringed at his wife on that little island with the people who rescued her. ?What, you mean you don?t have any blood, plasma, CAT scan machines on this dirty little island! I have a facial and massage at 3 and no plasma TV to watch my soap operas! No hot Water! No wonder you people are so smelly!?

Episode ends with the usual piano heartstring music about how it brought the family all closer together. Mark my words. When the kids are grown up in another ten years they will all realize the needless danger this smirking ****** bag put them all in and he will have to get down on his one remaining knee to beg their forgiveness.

Instead of being happy to have their affluence and great lifestyles they have to constantly keep up with the Joneses and show everyone else up. It is this mentality that has destroyed our economy. Hopefully Long John Silver has a lot less money than he did to further endanger his clan and stop playing Ned Flanders to everyone else?s Homer Simpson: ?Hidley Ho neighbor! Just parking my BRAND NEW YACHT. Be with you in a minute.? Also laughed at the final tag. ?His family won?t be joining him this time.?

[mavrik36able]

im not entirley sure you understand, i have been offshore sailing and i can tell you right now that your more likley to be killed driving to walmart than you are to die sailing. this was a freak accident that, granted, never should have happened. and dont try to tell me that if you had the money to buy what you wanted most and do what you wanted most you wouldnt. and the kids are actually glad to have gone sailing anyway, or atleast thats the impression i got when i met the dad and wife. also as for the family not going with him hes going alone because his kids are in colledge and cant just leave

[herpesfinder]

hope the family members are safe in the end

[Gratitude7]

I pray that this family has done the most important thing which is to accept the Lord Jesus Christ as their Saviour. I have no doubt that it was He who saved their lives.
What an awesome story!!

[msmithy]

saw the 1st two live to tell and they were pretty interesting but this last one, i switched channels after 10 minutes because I have no interest in watching a rich family who are sailing around the world get into trouble and eventually, everything will turn out o.k., boooring. rich people who have happy endings just don't make great ratings.

i don't think i'll be watching more live to tells

[MilanLA222]

Mrs. Zirinsky, the producer of the Black Wave segment should get award for being able take 3 still photos and 4 video portraits - and stretch them like a bungee for full hour while telling boring story that could be said in 5 minutes.

[ApacheOne]

Ever since I read Black Wave last year, I wanted to see this story on film, and 48 Hours did not dissappoint. Yet, some of the criticisms listed here are absolutely laughable, and seem to come from people who do not grasp life's simplest concept of risk and reward. I admire this family, and the way they reacted to a life or death crisis. In the length of a single heartbeat, their life changed forever. And while it is brutal that John had to lose his leg in this wreck, I think his family will benefit forever from this experience in ways we can hardly imagine. This would make a great movie.

[mavrik36able]

AMEN! risk and reward is a good way of putting it, you dont get something for nothing and all those to scared to do something a little dangerous should go back to their nice, safe cubicles

[Russelstages]

I viewed the program and found it authentic and interesting. I saw another clip, about this Black Wave story, some months ago. I didn't know that it would be on the "Live to Tell" segment of CBS until a couple of days before. I have been a sailor most of my life, and although I have not been in a ship wreck, such as this, I have witness the unbelievable power of Mother . I have a great respect for the ocean.
This story shows the courage of a family, when the chips are down, and the boy scout in most of us. These kids and mom did what it takes to survive a very bad situation and rescue dad. I would like to see how some of the other commenter's would handle a situation this dynamic.
The reasons for the accident are irrelevant, probably a miss calculation or out dated chart. The out come of the catastrophe is the key. The unity of this group of people, and everyone doing something to save dad, rather than panic and chaos.
I bet, if you took a pole, how many people have come this close to death and suvived. Then compound that by saying how many have come this close to death at sea, hundreds of miles from civilization. A very small percentage, probably less that 1 tenth of 1 percent. That is the story, in my eyes.
I hope the Gods of Neptune, and Mother are as good to me, in my travels.
RussellStages

[mavrik36able]

i agree totally, some people just dont have the perspective that experience sailing provides and so are somewhat ignorant in the finer points of wreck survival

[oliver1099]

This is nothing but a badly-overdramatized version of a relatively minor incident, brought on by a narcissistic dufus. Story: Dufus grounds his boat on a reef, breaking the hull and taking on water. Mast falls on Dufus' leg, injuring him, and ultimately causing an amputation. Family dramatizes minor incidents, eg. pulling mast off Dufus' leg, as 'heroics'. CBS collaboates by showing "Hawaii 5-0" style towering wave (which would surely have splintered craft) as transition to commercial break cut-ins. Also by allowing family to deliver carefully rehearsed statements about their suppossed family catharsis, to raise interest in other themes underling their book deal. "We all LEARNED something....." blah blah blah "Family is IMPORTANT !!! (duuuuuuh!!)

Family is rescued after only SIX HOURS on reef, by local family and worldwide chain of civil servants and French navy, which spent tens of thousands of dollars on copters and a jet plane to locate their signal and take them to hospital.

Dufus, who now needs a new boat, starts rehearsing book pitch before the kids are even dried off. CBS obliges, showing cover of Dufus' book during transition to commercials. Dufus takes book profits and buys new boat. Watch out, taxpayers!! Where is the STORY here?!!!!??