Chapter 1200 - The Storm

Lin Chuanqing decided everyone should abandon ship—all personnel would go ashore to weather the storm. As a veteran fisherman, he knew typhoons all too well. Fishing boats sheltering in port could still be destroyed with all hands during a strong typhoon, which was why the rule was that no one stayed aboard during such weather.

"Abandon ship entirely? Isn't leaving no one aboard too dangerous?" Zhou Weisen was immediately alarmed.

"My dear Brother Zhou, if a typhoon truly sweeps over our heads, we'll be lucky to escape with our lives—and you're still thinking about the ships?" Lin Chuanqing lit a cigarette and took several fierce drags.

"But we've already reached the sheltered anchorage..."

"You really don't understand typhoons." Lin Chuanqing shook his head repeatedly. Zhou Weisen didn't argue further—Lin Chuanqing was the squadron commander and an old sea dog. It was best to follow his judgment.

Lin Chuanqing immediately ordered some personnel ashore with tools and materials to establish a temporary camp on Samar Island. Meanwhile, the ship's boats, light weapons, radio equipment, controlled items, and plenty of supplies and gear were all transferred to shore in preparation for the worst.

Under Lin Chuanqing's direction, the remaining crew prepared the vessels: boilers were shut down, all watertight doors sealed, sails and all loose items on deck stowed below, and whatever couldn't be stowed was lashed securely. Finally, Lin Chuanqing ordered the bilges flooded to increase draft and lower the center of gravity.

The Feiyun worried Lin Chuanqing most. At barely over a hundred tons full displacement, she would have difficulty surviving a typhoon. He proposed hauling her onto the beach itself. So the sailors worked together, offloading materials from the Nongchao to construct a temporary slipway. The Feiyun's masts and sails were completely dismantled, and her hull was pulled up the beach to shelter behind the shore, secured with ropes and anchor chains.

Night fell. On the beach by the camp, a bonfire burned. Zhou Weisen and Lin Chuanqing stood shoulder to shoulder at the edge of the camp, gazing anxiously at the restless sea.

"I don't think we should sleep tonight—everyone should stand rotating watches."

"You go rest first—you take the second half of the night," Zhou Weisen said. "I won't be able to sleep the first half anyway."

At that moment, four hundred kilometers to the south-southwest beyond Mindanao Island, a disaster was bearing down on the transmigrators.

No one knew which typhoon of the year this was—what later generations would come to call the "Philippine Sea Butterfly Storm." It was racing northward along the eastern Philippine archipelago at thirty kilometers per hour. The radius of its ten-level wind field reached one hundred kilometers; its seven-level wind circle extended three hundred. For the Spanish in Manila, they would merely graze the seven-level ring—hardly remarkable in a region frequently battered by typhoons, and thus worthy of no special record. Consequently, the Grand Library's archives held not a single word about this typhoon.

But for Samar Island, it would deliver devastating force.

Qian Shuiting was jolted awake. Wind howled in his ears; fat raindrops pounded painfully against his body. The hastily-built grass huts had blown away to parts unknown. He scrambled up groggily, finding the wind so strong he could barely stand.

The fire had long since gone cold. In the pitch darkness where he couldn't see his hand before his face, only occasional lightning revealed wavering silhouettes of trees and a few half-prostrate figures. Even shouting at the top of his lungs, his voice was swallowed by the roar of wind. He could roughly tell the wind was blowing almost due north, from sea toward shore. Fortunately the camp was on high ground and hadn't yet been swamped by waves.

Rain lashed his face; he could barely keep his eyes open. He could only hear himself muttering reflexively, "It's over—all over." The power of nature was simply too immense.

Suddenly, an extraordinarily bright bolt of lightning struck downward from the heavens, slamming into the sea. The flash was so intense it momentarily blinded him. As his vision recovered in the renewed darkness, rolling thunder persisted for a good ten seconds.

The wind and rain continued until the next morning. Though his watch showed past six o'clock, the sky remained deeply overcast, the wind and rain still fierce, visibility extremely poor. The wind blew straight toward shore, and rank upon rank of gray-white waves rolled in from the distance, building higher and higher until they formed breakers nearly ten meters tall that shattered against the coastal coral reef and surged up the beach.

Where the Nongchao had anchored, there was no longer any sign of the ship. Scattered debris and torn canvas littered the shoreline. Zhou Weisen's heart twisted with anguish—the Nongchao had clearly met a terrible fate.

Though the transmigrators had lost ships before, this was the first time they had lost a virtually new steam-powered warship like the Nongchao. This alone would cast a shadow over their entire operation. He couldn't help but bitterly regret not simply returning home when they had the chance—completing a perfect mission—rather than grasping for more and ending up with this.

Over a hundred sailors and marines gathered in the camp, which the storm had ravaged to tatters. Exhausted and hungry, they could barely move in the fierce winds. Though Zhou Weisen and Lin Chuanqing were frantic, there was little they could do under such conditions. Among the debris they managed to find only some military rations, which barely filled their bellies.

It wasn't until after noon that the wind and waves began to subside. Lin Chuanqing estimated they had entered the typhoon's eye. He immediately ordered a roll call, which revealed that eleven people had gone missing during the night's storm. While organizing search parties, he also ordered that hot food be prepared and the camp tidied up. A team was dispatched to the water's edge to assess the Nongchao's condition and search for any trace of the missing.

By then the rain had slackened and visibility improved. Zhou Weisen led the exploration team along the coast. Less than two hundred meters away, they found the Nongchao.

The 901 gunboat had capsized, lying on her side upon the coral reef about a hundred meters from shore. Her mast and smokestack were snapped off completely. One 130mm main gun had fallen from the deck and now jutted up from the reef, only the muzzle showing. The wreckage of a typewriter gun was embedded in the sand, its barrel twisted into a bizarre mass of steel tentacles.

The exploration team searched along the shoreline. Besides driftwood and the ship's debris, they found several shattered corpse fragments. Some still bore identifiable sailor's uniforms—these men had apparently been swept overboard during the night's storm and hurled against the coast, dashed upon the jagged, unyielding coral. There was virtually no hope of survival.

Zhou Weisen went to check on the Feiyun—she had come through unscathed on land, though the gale had shifted her hull somewhat. Mendoza had spent the entire terrifying night huddled in a tent praying. Now, seeing Zhou Weisen return, she flung herself into his arms like a bird returning to its nest, unleashing a torrent of Spanish while clutching his face and kissing him frantically.

Zhou Weisen had to make an effort to comfort his wife, thinking to himself that these Latin mares were really high-strung...

By the second roll call in the afternoon, the missing had dropped to six—the others had lost their bearings in the dark and made their way back after dawn.

It wasn't until the following morning that the wind and waves had mostly calmed. Taking advantage of low tide, they rowed a boat out to the Nongchao to inspect the damage.

The Nongchao lay on her side atop the reef, hull breached and flooded in multiple places, everything on deck swept into chaos. Repairs would be a massive undertaking—just righting and refloating her would be an enormous project, let alone assessing the unknown extent of hull damage and keel deformation. For a capsized vessel, they were utterly powerless.

"Well, we've become Robinson Crusoes," Zhou Weisen said dejectedly.

"It could be worse—we have plenty of people, we're well-armed, and we have a radio. We can play island lords here for a while. Before long, the Navy will send rescue. And the Feiyun is completely intact. As long as we have a ship, there's nothing to fear." Lin Chuanqing seemed unconcerned.

"Let's radio Lingao immediately and request a rescue ship."

Afterward, they gathered all the officers and petty officers to discuss how to hold out. Duties were assigned: some would rebuild the camp, others would salvage whatever could be recovered from the Nongchao's wreckage, still others would venture onto the island to cut timber for building materials and firewood. The rest would search the coast for the missing, recover and bury the dead at sea, and collect driftwood to dry for fires.

Meanwhile, at Lingao, the Executive Committee's atmosphere was deceptively calm on the surface—yet oppressively tense beneath. Executive Committee members and the Navy's Chen Haiyang had gathered, anxiously awaiting news. Since receiving the Feiyun's telegram on the afternoon of July 16th announcing their premature return to seek shelter, everyone at the Executive Committee and Naval Headquarters had been waiting at Lingao's main radio station. But they received no further transmissions from the Feiyun or the 854-refit—only the two returning ships continued reporting their progress as they passed through the Babuyan Channel.

By the morning of July 17th, they could wait no longer.

"Something's really gone wrong—and it must be serious. Otherwise, there's no way both ships would go completely silent. Did they really encounter a typhoon?"

No one wanted to voice this possibility that had been on everyone's minds. Finally Ma Qianzhu broke the silence: "Old Chen, can we send a rescue team? Either have the Daishuang turn back or send the 8154 directly."

"The 901's endurance is insufficient—we can't have her turn back to investigate. Besides, without the Daishuang's escort, the Haifeng would be very vulnerable while towing a galleon. The 8154 fishing vessel doesn't have enough fuel to reach that far."

"The Haitian is at Hong Kong awaiting refit. We could suspend the refit and have her make the run to the Philippines first." Chen Haiyang said. "The Haitian hasn't been heavily used—the refit isn't particularly urgent."

He Ming added: "Beiwei is at Xiangshan with a team doing training exercises. We could reassign them aboard as a precaution against unexpected situations."

"But they're unfamiliar with the sea lanes and the situation."

"Then let's do it this way. Send the telegram."

(End of Chapter)