The moment before, the horizon had been clear; now, as if by magic, a massive vessel had appeared in the blackness. It was all too much to comprehend. For a second, like a man staring at an avalanche unable to move, the crew stood mute as the mysterious leviathan approached.

There was only one chance to save the crew of PT-109. They needed to get out of the way — and fast. Kennedy rammed the throttle forward.

Belowdecks in the overheated engine room, Pappy McMahon heard one of the engines race. Unfortunately, the drive was not engaged, and now that the engine rpm had increased, there was no way for McMahon to slam her into forward without stripping the gears off the shaft.

For the next few seconds, PT-109 was a sitting duck.

On the bow of Amagiri, the gunners could not depress the guns low enough to take a shot.

“Steer straight at the ship,” Hanami ordered the helmsman.

Hanami stared out the starboard window at the men on the deck of the PT boat. Two blond-haired men were behind the helm; on the foredeck a man struggled with an artillery piece.

Ross tried to fire the thirty-seven-millimeter gun, but he simply did not have enough time. Kennedy, who by now realized he had throttled up the wrong engine, pulled back on the throttle, but it was too late. The Japanese destroyer was now only feet away.

And then it happened.

Metal met wood like a machete hacking off a tree branch.

In the forward gun turret, Marney saw Amagiri approach only seconds before he was crushed by the bow. The teenager, who had been with the crew only a few weeks, died in the warm water of Blackett Strait thousands of miles from his home in Chicopee.

Andrew Jackson Kirksey, sleeping on the aft starboard deck, managed to rise to his elbows before Amagiri slammed into PT-109. He left behind a wife and young son. Neither his nor Marney’s body was ever found.

One second Pappy McMahon was staring at a racing engine; the next found him on the deck of the engine room of PT-109. As if in a dream, a line of fire came into his view. This was followed by a black shape scraping through the engine room. A few seconds later, McMahon felt water, and when he struggled to regain his footing, he was, strangely enough, looking out the stem of the ship at the sea. He could smell the fire before he felt the pain.

On Amagiri, Commander Hanami felt his ship pass through the PT boat with barely a shudder.

“Damage report!” he shouted to his second in command, who raced from the pilothouse.

“How’s she feel?” he asked Coxswain Doi.

“There is a slight vibration, sir,” Doi answered.

“Reduce speed to thirty knots,” Hanami ordered, “and see if it smoothes out.”

Then he began to write notes in the ship’s log about the encounter.

The stern of PT-109, burdened with an engine, plunged down into the black water.

Pappy McMahon, burned by a sudden fire, was plunging down through the water, spinning like a top from the turbulence caused by Amagiri’s propeller wake. Heavily weighted and with a rotting life vest, he struggled to swim toward the light on the surface. He popped to the surface, surrounded by a sea of burning gasoline.

Ensign Thorn had been hurtled into the water at the moment of impact, as were Albert, Zinser, Harris, Starkey, and Johnston. Miraculously, the bow of PT-I09 remained afloat and Kennedy, Maguire, and Mauer remained aboard. Henry Ross had first ridden out the collision on deck but then decided it was safer in the water. As soon as he slipped into the wetness, he realized his mistake. The heavy layer of gasoline on the water caused fumes that quickly sickened him. Struggling to breathe, he fainted and floated on the water in his orange kapok life vest.

“Into the water,” Kennedy ordered Maguire and Mauer. “The boat might explode.”

The three men entered the water, then swam a short distance away. They waited until Amagiri’s wake and the strong currents in Blackett Strait carried away the burning slick of gasoline.

“Back to the boat,” Kennedy said a few minutes later.

The men swam back to PT-109 and climbed onto what was left of the wreckage. The boat was riding in the water, bow in the air, with the shattered stern lapping at the edge of the water. She was afloat, but there was no way to know for how long.

“Mauer,” Kennedy ordered, “see if you can find the blinker.”

Mauer scrambled into the battered hull and searched until he found the metal tube that encased a battery-operated light used for signaling. “Found it, sir,” he said.

“Climb as high up onto the bow as you feel safe and start signaling for the others,” Kennedy said. “There must be others from the crew in the water.”

“What do you want me to do?” Maguire asked.

“Help Mauer, and keep watch for anyone who is out there,” Kennedy said, as he began to remove his shoes and shirt. “I’m going into the water to see who I can find.”

High on a peak on Kolombangara Island, Reg Evans scanned the night water with his binoculars.

Just north of Plum Pudding Island, past the halfway point west in Blackett Strait, was a section of water aflame. Evans recorded the position. Then he lay on his cot for a few hours of rest.

As soon as Kennedy swam into the blackness, Mauer and Maguire began to hear the faint sound of voices from across the water.

“Help, help,” Zinser screamed. “It’s Ensign Thom — I think he’s drowning.”

Maguire had no desire to climb back into the gasoline-saturated water, but he knew he needed to. Grabbing a rope from the locker, he secured it to the hulk of PT-109 and slid into Blackett Strait.

Ensign Ross awoke from his faint, floating in the black water. For a few moments, he had no idea what had happened and how he had ended up in his situation. A few minutes passed before his head began to clear enough to assess the situation. He could just see the outline of a pair of men floating in the water nearby, and he swam over to them.

“Thom’s delirious,” Zinser said, as Ross came into sight.

Thorn was fighting an invisible opponent. Ross reached behind him and took him in his arms.

“Lenny,” he said, “it’s Barney.”

A short distance away, Maguire swam toward the three men, the lifeline from PT-109 giving him his only sense of security. Fumes rose from the water, and Maguire’s head was spinning.

“I have a line to the boat,” he said.

With the blinker as their guide, the men slowly began to make their way back to the floating hulk.

A short distance away, Charles Harris bobbed on the water with an injured leg. Seeing another body floating on the water, he swam closer. The body was the badly burned Pappy McMahon, who was drifting in and out of consciousness. He held on to McMahon.

Yards away, Kennedy swam through the water. Harris heard him shouting for the crewmen.

“Lieutenant Kennedy,” Harris screamed, “over here.”

Kennedy followed the voice, and soon the pair of men materialized out of the gloom.

“McMahon is hurt,” Harris said, as Kennedy came alongside.

“How are you?”

“My leg is injured but I think I can swim,” Harris said.

“I’ll tow Pappy,” Kennedy said. “You just follow behind.”

Kennedy grabbed McMahon’s life vest and began to pull him back toward the floating wreck of PT-109. Harris was having trouble keeping up — his leg was numb, and he was in shock. After Kennedy and McMahon disappeared from view, Harris began to wonder if he was going to die in the water. His will was fading, and the water was warm and comforting. Just when he had resigned himself to death or capture, Kennedy reappeared out of the blackness and grabbed hold. Harris tried kicking, but only one leg was working.