 Captain Harmsen and his chief engineer Kaiser are traveling from Algeria to Hamburg in the container ship "Anastasia", and are looking forward to a normal, relaxed voyage. Harmsen is in need of peace and quiet as it is # his wife has separated from him. Shortly after their departure from Algeria, however, the first problems start to loom: the ship is traveling too slowly. While Kaiser and an engineer named Droll are about to repair an oil pipe that seems to have been disconnected, a fire suddenly breaks out in the engine room. Kaiser and Droll manage to escape, but now the engines have stopped. There seems to be something strange going on up on deck. Meanwhile, in Hamburg, financial problems are forcing shipowner Nielson to sell shares in his shipping company to a businessman named Schröter, who shows great sympathy for the problems being experienced by the "Anastasia". The situation back on the ship becomes aggravated when Captain Harmsen suddenly discovers a group of Algerian refugees who had been hiding in one of the containers. A small boy among them seems to be extremely ill. Harmsen immediately has Sofia Minardi the Italian physician flown in to perform an appendectomy on the boy # and does his best to help her during the operation. Thanks to the repair work by Kaiser and Droll, the "Anastasia" can finally continue on her voyage # but peace just won t return up on deck. There must be narcotics concealed somewhere on board, because the drugs mafia is pursuing the ship... After a few more developments the "Anastasia" makes it into Hamburg harbor, together with its freight and the Algerian refugees. The shipping company s new shareholder Schröter is placed under arrest for being behind the drugs ring, and so is his sidekick Riedel, the steersman! Meanwhile the captain and physician Sofia make a tentative arrangement to meet up again on land...