Marine pilots guide massive cargo ships through narrow channels and open water, but the riskiest part of the job happens before they ever touch the wheel: climbing a rope ladder between a moving ship and a small boat in gale-force wind. The film follows harbor pilot Gerhard Janssen and sea pilot Dominik Thieben as they board the cargo ship Silver Soul in force 8 winds, navigating the Ems River out of a German harbor and into the North Sea, with oncoming traffic, poor visibility, and little room to maneuver. Off Borkum, a pilot boat has to pick them up for the return trip, a transfer that has killed pilots before; the film notes a British pilot's death and a Borkum pilot's hospitalization for hypothermia just weeks apart. When waves get too rough for boats, helicopters winch pilots aboard by rope, tolerating gusts up to hurricane force. Shot aboard the vessels themselves, the documentary stays close to the crews as they weigh, maneuver by maneuver, how much risk the job actually demands.