Expositor's Bible Commentary Commentary Acts 27:39

"And when it was day, they knew not the land: but they perceived a certain bay with a beach, and they took counsel whether they could drive the ship upon it." — Acts 27:39 (ASV)

With a profusion of nautical detail that makes this chapter unique, Luke tells how the ship was beached amid the pounding surf on a sandbar some distance from land and began to break apart. From then on it was every man for himself.