IT WASN'T UNTIL TUESDAY AFTERNOON THAT THE BOATS ON THE Grand Banks were able to check in with one another. The Eishan Marti, which was closest to Billy Tyne's last known location, reported that she was completely rolled by one huge wave; her wheelhouse windows were blown out, and she was left without rudder or electronics. The Lori Dawn Eight had taken so much water down her vents that she lost an engine and headed in. The Mary T had fared well but had already taken $165,000 worth of fish in nine days, so she headed in, too. The Hannah Boden, the Allison, the Mr. Simon, and the Miss Millie were way to the east and "had beautiful weather," in Albert Johnston's words. That left the Andrea Gail.

By Wednesday, October 30, the storm had retrograded so far to the west that conditions at sea were almost tolerable. At that point the worst of it was just hitting Gloucester. The Eastern Point neighborhood, where the town's well-to-do live, had been cut in half. Waves were rolling right through the woods and into some of the nicest living rooms in the state. On the Back Shore, 30-foot waves were tearing the facades off houses and claiming whole sections of Ocean Drive. The wind, whipping through the power lines, was hitting pitches that no one had ever heard before. Just up the coast in Kennebunkport, some Democrats were cheered to see boulders in the family room of President George Bush's summer mansion.

"The only light I can shed on the severity of the storm is that until then, we had never-ever had a lobster trap move offshore," said Bob Brown. "Some were moved 13 miles to the west. It was the worst storm I have ever heard of, or experienced."

By now the storm had engulfed nearly the entire eastern seaboard. Even in protected Boston Harbor, a data buoy measured wave heights of 30 feet. A Delta Airlines pilot at Boston's Logan Airport was surprised to see spray topping 200-foot construction cranes on Deer Island. Sitting on the runway waiting for clearance, his air speed indicator read 80 miles per hour. Off Cape Cod, a sloop named the Satori lost its life raft, radios, and engine. The three people in its crew had resigned themselves to writing good-bye notes when they were finally rescued 200 miles south of Nantucket by a Coast Guard swimmer who jumped, untethered, from a helicopter into the roiling waves. An Air National Guard helicopter ran out of fuel off Long Island, and its crew had to jump one at a time through the darkness into the sea. One man was killed and the other four were rescued after drifting throughout the night. All along the coast, waves and storm surge combined to act as "dams" that prevented rivers from flowing into the sea. The Hudson backed up 100 miles to Albany and caused flooding, so did the Potomac.

Brown tried in vain all day Wednesday to radio Tyne. That evening he finally got through to Linda Greenlaw, who said she'd last heard Billy Tyne talking to other boats on the radio Monday night. "Those men sounded scared, and we were scared for them," she said later. Later that night Brown finally alerted the U.S. Coast Guard.

"When were they due in?" the dispatcher asked.

"Next Saturday," Brown replied.

The dispatcher refused to initiate a search because the boat wasn't overdue yet. Brown then got the Canadian Coast Guard on the line. "I'm afraid my boat's in trouble, and I fear the worst," he told the dispatcher in Halifax. At dawn Canadian reconnaissance planes, which were already in the area, began sweeping for the Andrea Gail.