Cont: The sinking of MS Estonia: Case Reopened Part VI

[JayUtah]

Where MV Estonia sank was not due to chance, a freak storm, or a rogue captain.

MS Estonia sank because of a combination of otherwise individually survivable factors. Statistical probability works fine for reasoning about this. You've tried to make hay out of where and when it sank, but your argument that those circumstances were orchestrated to send a message is based on your several failures at numerology.

 

[Vixen]

Actually, the Stockholm Archipelago does. We have clear directions, starting from the entrances to the Archipelago and showing the route (fairways) into the harbors.

Here is the entrance to the Stockholm Archipelago at Söderarm. On the right hand side you can see how the route gets a direction with the red arrow and the two dots.

[imgw=640]https://i.postimg.cc/90XQhcKm/2023-10-04-16-11-51.jpg[/imgw]

We can see one green lateral marker just north of the Rommargrund lighthouse, and one red marker to the WSW, marker "Fl R 3s"

Zooming out a little, we can see how the routes continue. In this case one route terminates at the port of Kapellskär, while another continues in SW direction towards Stockholm.
[imgw=640]https://i.postimg.cc/cHxSKXmT/2023-10-04-16-12-00.jpg[/imgw]

So the lateral markers are definitely in the Archipelago. I have sailed and motored the Stockholm, Åland and Turku ones, and have personal experience, as well as the charts.

Having said that, the image of Viking Sally that Vixen previously posted is definitely not at sea but inside the Archipelago. Most probably close to a port. It could be Mariehamn, or it could be Nådendal (next to Turku) - I can't really geolocate it. I'm almost be 100% sure it's not the Frihamnen in Stockholm, the background does not match at all, and it's an area I'm familiar with and have navigated in.

Given how the ship is moving, I'd say that the photographer is probably standing on land in the port.

Unfortunately I can't share any more details from the chart I just brought out, since it got invaded by a monster...
[qimg]https://i.postimg.cc/ZRLHsL69/2023-10-04-16-26-58.jpg[/qimg]

What a helpful cat!

 

[SpitfireIX]

The mandatory requirement of free-float automatic EPIRB's was required compliance by passenger ferries by Aug 1993, pursuant to the IOM Chapter III regulation as passed in 1988 pursuant to the Herald of Free Enterprise public inquiry held in 1987.

No. I misinterpreted this the same way you have; however, AR and Jay corrected me, pointing out that according to the JAIC report, the Estonia was certified under a previous version of the regulations. This earlier (1978?) version did not require automatic-activation beacons. Unlike you, however, I was willing to admit my mistake.

 

[JayUtah]

So, what most people call a 'coincidence' like someone having the same name or even their dogs, is usually easily explicable. That is using the term 'coincidence' in the same way as 'chance' or 'luck'. When you look into it, it means nothing at all except some fortuitous coming together of two or more events...

You claimed coincidences were paranormal and cited to the Jung-Pauii hypothesis as proof.

 

[GlennB]

Er, I didn't say anything about "British secret agents infiltrated German front lines to collect German gossip".

Your original quote contradicts this. In case you missed it, little upthread (and a dozen other times) :

"The daily on-the-spot TIMES newspaper report on the Battle of Stalingrad, together with maps and charts brought it to life for me. They even had reporters on the German front line, who must have been British secret agents to have infiltrated it in the first place. "

Why do you continually lie when those very lies have been shown here, in black+white, time and time again?

 

[Steve]

Your original quote contradicts this. In case you missed it, little upthread (and a dozen other times) :

"The daily on-the-spot TIMES newspaper report on the Battle of Stalingrad, together with maps and charts brought it to life for me. They even had reporters on the German front line, who must have been British secret agents to have infiltrated it in the first place. "

Why do you continually lie when those very lies have been shown here, in black+white, time and time again?

Vixen does not comprehend that people can look back and see previous posts.

 

[Andy_Ross]

AIUI from reading the reports, when the EPIRB is taken out of the box it needs to be tuned in with its registration number or something. Things might have changed with modern developments in satellite signalling but even with Bluetooth one still has to align one's device to it.

Then you haven't read the reports correctly.

Ship information is entered by the manufacturer before the unit is delivered. There has never been any way for the user to do anything other than set them off or test the battery.

Most are supplied and used without any specific vessel information, they are identified by a unique serial number registered with the operating authority

 

[Andy_Ross]

You just aren't getting that the ship's electricians set the EPIRBS up in their brackets one either side of the bridge together with the Hydrostatic Unit. This means once released by the HRU, which is triggered by being immersed in up to 4m of water - or removed manually to be thrown overboard - the device then once free of its cage bobs up to the surface and commences to send a signal to the COSPAS-Sarsats satellite which alerts the maritime rescue services.

The mandatory requirement of free-float automatic EPIRB's was required compliance by passenger ferries by Aug 1993, pursuant to the IOM Chapter III regulation as passed in 1988 pursuant to the Herald of Free Enterprise public inquiry held in 1987.

The Rockwater search team stipulate in their report that they recovered one of the HRU's and that the brackets holding the EPIRBS were empty. The maritime official in charge at Estonia the country said they had assumed from the lack of signal that the EPIRBS had got trapped underneath the wreck and hence, had failed to bob to the surface to send a signal.

They were free-float automatic beacons, no two ways about it. It is irrefutable.

They were both recovered and we're manual beacons, they were found to be in working order.

Estonia wasn't required to replace the manual buoys until 1999 as allowed by the new regulation.

 

[Andy_Ross]

.
[*]When Germany lost the Battle of Stalingrad in 1944, that signalled the end of the war.

Battle of Stalingrad ended in early 1943, not 1944.

Last time I checked the war in Europe finished in 1945

At least get the basics right.

 

[lobosrul5]

That is inaccurate. After the 1939 Winter War and the Molotov-Ribbentrop Treaty of 1939, Germany and USSR had already agreed to carve up Europe between west and east, with Finland going to the USSR, so Germany never had Finland in its sights.

• In Germany's three-front attack on the USSR, St Petersburg, Moscow and Stalingrad, Germany entered Russia from the North via Finland.
• Finland, having lost 10% of its land to the USSR in 1939 as a peace treaty, took the opportunity to claim that land back, plus a little bit more.
• Finland reclaimed Karelia as far East as Lake Onega and Petrovsk, which it occupied for three years.
• When Germany lost the Battle of Stalingrad in 1944, that signalled the end of the war.
• USSR then made Finland leave Karelia, which it did.
• It was ordered to kick out the Germans who had various bases, causing the bloody Lapland War, in which Finnish Lapland was destroyed.
• Finland and Germany were co-belliigerents against the USSR but had different aims.
• Finland never shared Nazi ideology.
• It had Jewish troops who were allowed to worship in their faith.
• Aside from one or two rogue Police Chiefs and Generals, it never persecuted Jews or gypsies.

As for the issue of the UK claiming to have not known about the Nazi 'Final Solution' of Jews until after the war, I found reports in the TIMES as early as 1942 reporting exactly on the brutal enforced rounding up of Jewish citizens in Europe and of the killings. Thus, I believe early newspaper reports often do reveal what has really gone on before the news gets censored or denied. There were news reports of Ensign Ken Svensson in an early day Swedish paper saying he had rescued seven or nine, depending in which edition of AFTONBLADET and taken them to Huddinge Hospital at two in the morning, when the JAIC Report says something quite different completely. Likewise, the Swedish Chief of Maritime Affairs, Stenmark, told a press conference that Bildt and the Finnish & Estonian Prime Ministers were going to Turku to interview Capt Piht (second captain) that morning. Further reputable newspapers, including Danish newspapers, the Helsingin Sanomat and the London Evening news, reported that Piht had been last seen in Helsinki and now no-one was sure of his whereabouts. The Evening standard headline was: 'THE GUILTY WILL BE BROUGHT TO JUSTICE!'

In addition to this, Interpol issued an International Arrest Warrant for Piht's arrest dated 11 October 1994.

Some of this is wrong, and the rest has nothing whatsoever to do with he discussion at hand, or arguing against claims never made. No one here has suggested Finland had anti-Semitic aims during the Continuation War.

 

[lobosrul5]

Where MV Estonia sank was not due to chance, a freak storm, or a rogue captain.

Hey, you got two out of three right, congratulations!

It was not a freak storm. It was a gale. It was a "normal" bad weather event for that time of year on the Baltic.

The captain was not "rogue" he was not in on any conspiracy. He did not purposely sink his ship for 10 billion Rubles and a one way plane ticket to BA.

Chance: it wasn't even that really. It was repeatedly sailing a ship for conditions she was not safely capable of sailing in. Years and years of degradation meant that eventually this was going to happen. The only chance was that it was that day in that location. It would've happened eventually unless she only sailed in calm seas.

 

[Vixen]

We have pilots in in the Stockholm area also, that would board the ships outside of Söderarm or Sandhamn, and stay on all the way into the port.

However, for the ferries that run the regular route, the captains onboard have actually been trained and have the certificates to be allowed to sail the routes without having to use an external pilot.

Actually, second captain, Avo Piht was on his way to Stockholm that morning to take his archipelago exams.

 

[Vixen]

Then please illuminate me. What was your point in bringing up the Times reporting with either embedded reporters or spies* in the frontlines during the Battle of Stalingrad?!

*can you get a grasp of just how utterly insanely ridiculous it would be for the British government to allow reporting from a spy on the frontline?!?

ETA: oh, catching up on the thread I see you are attempting to gaslight us by now claiming your supposed article was some opinion piece about what German troops thought of British troops or something. Rather than what you actually originally wrote.

Let's start again. Within one sentence you can have a list of discrete items which can be separated by a comma, if more than two and by a conjuction, 'and' or 'or' or similar for the last item in that list. So, for example, say you are talking about biscuits. You could say, "I went to the shop to buy some chocolate fingers, chocolate digestives and gingernuts." = Three different items but all things you intend to buy.

In my sentence I similarly described three different types of interesting articles in the TIMES: maps of battles such as Stalingrad, the battle of Stalingrad and an article on German soldiers and British soldiers. Just as you should not confuse gingernuts with chocolate biscuits, nor should you read the latter as being about Stalingrad.

As a pointer, Stalingrad was Germany versus the USSR and hence any correspondent who did get to the German frontline in Stalingrad would surely be interviewing about their view on the Soviets.

 

[Vixen]

We aren't getting it, because you are wrong. They were free float, but not immersion activated.

Er...you do know what 'hydrostatic' means...?

 

[Vixen]

Not to mention that the idea that the British would risk the lives and waste the time of valuable spies in an attempt to gather information that would have been of marginal importance at best is absurd to begin with.

That is not how it works. The correspondent likely had contacts who relayed him the information.

 

[JayUtah]

Er...you do know what 'hydrostatic' means...?

Yes. It's my profession to know. Hydrostatic release is not the same as immersion activation. This has been carefully explained to you dozens of times. We all understand it. You don't.

 

[Vixen]

Jack and I both quoted your post where you said exactly that. Your entire response to Jack's post was "<YAWN>", and you didn't respond to mine at all. So I repeat the salient portion of mine below:

As you can see from the sentence structure it is speculation and an opinion, not a statement of fact. The fact is, a newspaper correspondent was often the perfect cover for a spy and still is today.

Who knows where the correspondent got his information from. We can only speculate.

If I were to cite a newspaper article claiming to report what Russian troops were saying about the Ukrainians, you would certainly speculate the journalist had inside contacts or there was someone on the Russian side leaking the story.

 

[GlennB]

In my sentence I similarly described three different types of interesting articles in the TIMES: maps of battles such as Stalingrad, the battle of Stalingrad and an article on German soldiers and British soldiers. Just as you should not confuse gingernuts with chocolate biscuits, nor should you read the latter as being about Stalingrad.

Bollocks. Your statement, yet again :

"The daily on-the-spot TIMES newspaper report on the Battle of Stalingrad, together with maps and charts brought it to life for me. They even had reporters on the German front line, who must have been British secret agents to have infiltrated it in the first place. "

"They", here and in any sane world, can only refer to The Times newspaper.

 

[SpitfireIX]

That is not how it works. The correspondent likely had contacts who relayed him the information.

That's not what you said. You wrote "[The Times] even had reporters on the German front line, who must have been British secret agents to have infiltrated it in the first place."

 

[Vixen]

No. I misinterpreted this the same way you have; however, AR and Jay corrected me, pointing out that according to the JAIC report, the Estonia was certified under a previous version of the regulations. This earlier (1978?) version did not require automatic-activation beacons. Unlike you, however, I was willing to admit my mistake.

MV Viking Sally was not even built until 1980. When it became MV Estonia in 1993 and refurbished of course it was fully compliant with IOM Chapter III re EPIRBS; it even had brackets for the beacon built either side of the bridge, as specified in IOM Chapter III! Manually-activated-beacons-only are kept inside the vessel and ready to hand. Otherwise, how else are you supposed to switch them on manually?