The four divers had been missing for about 14 hours and the sun had set long ago. It was a moonless night and the only means they had to mark their position was a flashlight. Despite the long odds, a Coast Guard plane managed to spot the divers in the middle of the endless ocean and call in a Navy destroyer to pluck them out of the water.
It is because of the determination of their rescuers that this story did not end in tragedy.
The four divers, whose ages range from 16 to 64, had been diving with scuba gear about 63 miles east of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, when they went missing on Aug. 13, according to the Coast Guard.
The group had gone spearfishing that morning, but the current and strong seas caused the divers to resurface far from their boat, Coast Guard Petty Officer Carter Beck later told The Dispatch newspaper in Lexington, North Carolina.
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