A young naval aviator and his father are forced down by a violent hurricane in the Florida Bay and must ride out the storm aboard their amphibious plane. Stranded, they face armed captors and a sequence of dangers ashore that lead them into swamps and encounters with local Native groups. The narrative moves through episodes of imprisonment, escape attempts, improvised tactics in dugouts and dugouts, and tense aerial and water actions, building to coordinated advances and attacks around the Big Cypress marshes that resolve the immediate threats to the protagonists.