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On May 2 of this month an anniversary passed that few people are aware of. It was the thirty-eighth anniversary of an accident that claimed the lives of twenty-three people. Every year since 1970 the date has come and gone and the story of what happened that day has gone untold. Until now.

It was a Saturday. The Kentucky Derby ran that day. In Texas Arnold Palmer and Jack Nicklaus fought for the lead at the Byron Nelson golf classic. In the Caribbean a small jet with fifty-seven passengers and a crew of six was en route to the tropical island of St. Maarten. The weather, however, had turned bad with high winds, low ceilings, and poor visibility. The pilot’s attempts to land at St. Maarten were thwarted by the winds and rain. So he decided to head to a different airport, one where the weather was better. He didn’t make it. The plane ran out of fuel thirty-five miles short of St. Croix.

The plane remained afloat for five to ten minutes. Those who managed to make it out before the plane slipped beneath the waves were not out of danger. No life rafts had been launched. The one raft that had been positioned to launch, inflated unexpectedly inside the aircraft. It was late in the afternoon. It was already getting hard to see beneath the overcast skies. Ten- to fifteen-foot swells rose and fell in all directions. What followed was one of the most dramatic rescue efforts in the history of the Caribbean.

There are a number of reasons of why this story has never been told before. The accident happened long before satellite news networks like CNN. Additionally, the accident was sandwiched between two major news events: the Apollo 13 space flight a few weeks before, and the shootings at Kent State University two days later. Beyond limited news coverage, few who were involved in the accident were willing to discuss what happened while various investigations, job actions, and lawsuits played out. It would take time and the evolution of the Internet for this story to finally come to light.

For the past thirty-eight years the captain of the flight has been held responsible. To this day he has not once shifted blame to another individual. But the mistakes that he admits to are not the only ones that led to the accident. It would take several years of research and interviews with countless individuals to finally piece together the whole story.

Now for the first time the real story of what happened aboard ALM Flight 980 is told in the new book 35 Miles From Shore.