The Tracy brothers are sitting around the house relaxing. As John heads back up to Thunderbird Five, he calls Langstrom Fischler, whose CIRUS research station is investigating a hurricane, to ask if they're doing okay; Fischler reassures him that they are, but then is cut off. EOS reports that the station is, somehow, falling upwards, and that the lives of everyone on board are in danger. Thunderbird Two heads out to try to fix it, while Brains goes through a long list of safety devices and mechanisms and confirms, one by one, that Fischler didn't bother with them. Virgil and Gordon's attempt to repair the station's fans (which should bring it down) fails when Two gets electrocuted due to a lack of static-dampening plates and starts falling into the hurricane, forcing Gordon to abandon the rescue and take control of Two; this works, but Two is so badly damaged that it has to return to the island. Scott arrives in One but is also unable to deal with CIRUS's problems: they don't have escape pods, parachuting is impractical because they're directly above a hurricane, and Scott can't get them onto One before its engines are starved of oxygen. Alan is deployed in Three, since CIRUS is now too high for any aircraft; he is, of course, unsuccessful, and also the fans fall off in the process, damaging one of Three's engines and forcing Alan to return to base. John, the only remaining Tracy brother, hits upon a solution. He uses Thunderbird Five's docking gear to latch onto CIRUS and pulls it up so its crew can transfer to Five, nearly killing him and causing minor damage due to the insane gravity caused by John using Five as a spool to get CIRUS up more quickly. Finally, the CIRUS crew is saved, although Fischler is none too appreciative.
Tropes:
- Captain Obvious: CIRUS determines that a hurricane is, in fact, a hurricane.
- Complaining About Rescues They Don't Like: Fischler won't shut up about what a bad job he thinks International Rescue is doing.
- Lethally Stupid: Brains mentions that he went to school with Fischler, and that he tended to disregard safety in favor of...everything else. CIRUS has: no insulation on the heliblades keeping it from flying into the atmosphere (fried by a storm), no backup systems ("Sounds redundant"), or restarts ("Start something that's already started?"), no slow release valves on the balloons (too slow) no static dampening plates (leading to Thunderbird 2 getting fried when it touches CIRUS), no escape pods (but very stylish jumpsuits), and had balloons filled with hot hydrogen ions (which won't burst, but explode when they get high enough).
- Never My Fault: "Everyone but me, this is on you!" - Langstrom Fischler.
- No OSHA Compliance: No sane governmental organization would have let CIRUS fly, given the massive list of safety equipment it lacks. This unsafe, horrendously designed piece of crap is even a hazard to other aircraft; over the course of the rescue, it damages Thunderbirds 2 and 3, and Thunderbird 1 goes beyond its operational limits trying to follow it. (It is, however, noted at the end that Fischler Industries' license to operate spacecraft, which CIRUS was, has been pulled.)
- Tempting Fate: The discussion of what the record for "longest time without an emergency" is. Also applies to Fischler's lack of safety mechanisms.
