On August 8, 2010, a civilian airplane crashed in the Alaskan Chugach mountains. A special operations team in the U.S. Air Force was sent out to bring the survivors back to safety. Into the Storm brings this story to life through a new, interactive documentary form that gives users an immersive, firsthand look into what it takes to be a pararescue person. Dramatic storytelling, voice recordings from actual pararescue people and user interaction come together to allow people to participate in the story and feel directly involved. And as they follow along and participate in this life-changing journey, users learn if they have what it takes to become a pararescue person – inspiring a new generation to apply to enlist themselves.

Our execution was informed by three key considerations: the story, the environment and the user interactions. To make the experience as realistic as possible, we needed to know the timeline of the real-life events, the setbacks and decisions faced by the pararescue team and the exact weather conditions they worked against.

A detailed re-creation of the Chugach Mountains set the scene for the perilous experience. The entire journey is rendered in WebGL, employing effects like dynamic lighting, snow-on-lens effects, a particle system to create the snow and more. Each effect was added on a real-world scale to make every scene look as lifelike and physically accurate as possible, creating optimum immersion.

To take users along an unforgettable journey, we defined key moments in the mission where important decisions or events took place. Interactive hotspots invited users to work together with the Air Forces operations team. To ensure these interactions were user-friendly and not distracting from the story, we plotted interactions that would only require a simple gesture – scroll, drag or explore – whether the user was on mobile or desktop.

Each gesture is executed in a way that reinforces the narrative and enlivens the virtual environment. To follow the pararescue team’s footsteps, for example, users must scroll their way through the long trek. Scrolling faster decreases visibility in the windy blizzard conditions, making the scene feel more lifelike and hazardous. Other actions, like dragging the rescue helicopter to initiate next steps in the mission, helps users feel more involved as they dig deeper.

By bringing in-depth research, data and technology together in one project, we were able to build a highly accurate retelling of a real event. The visual complexity mixed with the simple scrolling story mechanic enabled an experience that was as spectacular as it was emotionally engaging.