The story begins with the steamship Andorra Star sending an SOS. She's sinking, and the people on board need to get to the lifeboat before she goes under. The problem is, there's too many people for the lifeboat to carry them safely... 

This radio adaptation coincides simultaneously with its publication, which appears in the April issue of Scribner's magazine, and six years later, the story was made into the movie, Lifeboat, directed by Alfred Hitchcock.