Nephi makes it very clear that this incident is a continuation of the birthright conflict with Laman and Lemuel. He specifically notes that they are angry with him because they “will not that our younger brother shall be a ruler over us.” Nevertheless, as the story unfolds, that is just what will be shown.
The set up for the incident has Nephi bound. While that was certainly a physical binding, Nephi parallels it to a spiritual binding, as indicated by the Liahona’s failure to work. The combination of the dire storm and the inability to use the Liahona to find a way out intensifies the problem.
There are two possibilities that are interesting for noting that the tempest was in its fourth day. Read from the Old World perspective, this would be an actual count of days, since the symbolic number would have been three days. However, if Nephi is writing for New World descendants, he might have included four days because in the New World the number four was particularly significant. Perhaps it was a coincidence of the actual count that happened to be symbolic in the New World.