Coast Guard: Mission Critical

USCG Air Station Miami has the impossible task of finding a missing 14-foot boat in a vast, churned up Atlantic Ocean; suspected drug smugglers in international waters.

Drug smugglers try to evade U.S. counter narcotics intelligence in the cover of night, but darkness doesn't stop the United States Coast Guard from taking down the suspects; surging high tides trap two hikers at sunset in Oregon.

The search and rescue crew from Station Marathon search for survivors when USCG Sector Key West receives a report of plane debris floating in the water; the USCGC Munro and Tactical Law Enforcement Team members engage in a high-speed chase.

Crews search for vessels in distress overtaken by storms; in the Florida Keys, a sailboat calls the Coast Guard for help; in the Pacific Northwest, a rookie rescue swimmer attempts to rescue a family and its dog in 20-foot, storm-ravaged seas.

In Oregon, the United States Coast Guard Air Station crew navigates shoreline terrain to extract a stranded hiker clinging to the edge of a cliff; in the Florida Keys, Station Marathon personnel are called on to rescue a man and his dog.

Sixty miles off the coast of Key West, Fla., a family cruise takes a terrible turn when Air Station Miami is launched to rescue a 6-year-old boy whose appendix might have ruputured.