Egan of Veracity Selfcare tried filling out FDIC forms to get back her startup’s money, desperately seeking to claw back anything she could. But the number and complexity of the forms confounded her, and she feared any errors would disqualify her from getting back vital cash. “It would probably kill my company,” she says.

Hyrkin, who lives in Palo Alto in the heart of Silicon Valley, got reassurance few others did by stopping by a nearby SVB branch at just the right time. “Lights were on, the parking lot was full. It was clear people were working,” he says. He approached someone taping a poster to the building’s exterior and they flashed an FDIC badge, saying that customers would have access to the $250,000 insured portion of deposits on Monday and any additional funds later in the week. Hyrkin judged that the company “would get enough of our money quickly enough” to be OK. But with the shocks of the past 24 hours still reverberating, he continued setting up new accounts to direct Issuu sales away from SVB just in case.

Patriot’s Wheeler, still literally at sea, had paid dearly for some peace of mind. The company hired attorneys at a rate of $1,700 an hour, who advised that payroll funds escrowed on behalf of customers should be protected because the money was already designated to be paid out. When the money would become accessible, no one knew for sure. Altogether, including taxes and the following week’s wages, about $100 million in client funds were locked up at SVB.

As Wheeler sat down for his brother’s wedding dinner aboard the cruise ship without mobile service, an iMessage came in over Wi-Fi from an SVB banker asking to chat. They relayed a message from Rob Freelen, a partner at VC firm Sozo Ventures and former SVB executive, who was among the Silicon Valley investors trying to influence lawmakers and the Biden administration to guarantee all SVB deposits. Political megadonors Reid Hoffman, a LinkedIn cofounder now at VC firm Greylock, and startup investor Ron Conway were reportedly part of that push.

Freelen had sought out Patriot because he saw it as a powerful example to get in front of Sherrod Brown, the US senator from Ohio and the chair of the senate’s banking committee. As the wedding party continued, Wheeler helped tap out a 13-tweet thread tagging Brown and other lawmakers, along with an open letter from Patriot CEO and founder Mike Kappel. It was scheduled to post early the following morning.

“We request that you consider the small businesses and their employees nationwide and #savesvb,” one of the tweets says. “This isn’t a handout for the tech-elite and their investors. This is a lifeline for the backbone of our economy and the prevention of catastrophic ripple effects.”

Backup plans began to materialize. Egan set up a GoFundMe crowdfunding campaign to cover her startup’s costs for the foreseeable future. Tovala’s Aronson persuaded her investors to finance a bridge loan.

Within an hour, and before Tovala’s loan was countersigned, their efforts proved superfluous. At 6:15 pm Eastern, the US government announced that it would ensure no SVB customer lost money, by tapping an insurance fund paid into by banks. Neither startup executive was ready to totally trust that all was safe, but Egan would eventually refund the money that had been raised in that hour.