One night in early 1976, the world of trauma medicine changed forever in a frozen Nebraska field where Dr. James Styner crashed his small airplane with his wife and four children aboard. The experience of the eight hours he spent isolated and awaiting rescue that never came, his journey to the local hospital where he found inadequate care, and his family's evacuation and arrival at the sanctity of Lincoln General Hospital compelled him to develop a revolutionary new concept of emergency medical care. That night Advanced Trauma Life Support was born, and grew to become the standard of emergency trauma care throughout the world. Today it continues to save countless lives and it continues to grow. This is the story of ATLS and that tragic night for the Styner family, but it is also the story of the author's personal journey to find the truth about the accident that not only took the life of his mother, but nearly took his - and how doing so was one of the most important things he ever did.