Tempest
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Sea storms have inspired poems and songs, and perhaps, a play by one of the western world's greatest playwrights, William Shakespeare.

Hi, I'm Bryan Yeaton and this is the Weather Notebook.

On June 2, 1609, a small fleet led by the flagship Sea Venture departed England on a rescue mission to the struggling young Virginia colony at Jamestown.

For fifty days, the Atlantic crossing remained uneventful, but a week from their expected landing, they sailed into disaster. A great storm, likely a hurricane, battered the convoy for three days with howling tempest and monstrous seas. Ships were scattered across the ocean by the storm.

Seven ships survived and struggled into Jamestown several days later. There, they mourned the perceived loss of their flagship separated from them in the storm.

The tempest had battered Sea Venture mercilessly, but at the time of greatest peril, Sea Venture received divine intervention. Miraculously, the sinking ship drifted onto the reefs between a group of islands and caught between the rocks, allowing the ship's full complement of 150 to struggle safely ashore.

Although too damaged for repair, Sea Venture, her planking supplemented by local red cedars, gave birth to two smaller vessels, Deliverance and Patience.

Forty-three weeks after being tossed onto the reef, the survivors finally reached Virginia, bringing much-needed food supplies.

Three years later, permanent settlers returned to those small islands to establish the colony of Bermuda whose official crest features Sea Venture battling the great storm. And, many scholars believe that in the accounts of the storm, shipwreck and survival, Shakespeare found the inspiration for his play "The Tempest".

Thanks today to contributing writer Keith Heidorn. The Weather Notebook is a production of the Mount Washington Observatory and is underwritten by the National Science Foundation.