Thrasybulus did return to action, however, at the Battle of Arginusae in 406 BC. There, he was a trierarch in the Athenian relief fleet sent out to assist the admiral Conon, who was blockaded at Mytilene. That battle was a major Athenian victory; after the battle, the generals in charge took the majority of their ships to attack the Peloponnesian fleet blockading Conon, leaving behind a force under Thrasybulus and his fellow trierarch Theramenes to rescue the survivors. This operation was thwarted, however, by a sudden storm which drove the rescue force to land, and a great number of Athenians—estimates as to the precise figure have ranged from near 1,000 to as many as 5,000—drowned. The result was one of the great Athenian political scandals of the war, which culminated in a vicious debate between Theramenes and the generals at Athens over who was to blame for the disaster, after which the generals were executed. Thrasybulus, for unknown reasons, seems to have had very little involvement in this debate.