The Sinking of MS Estonia: Case Re-Opened

[erwinl]

Not sure I understand your post but once the visor came open there were large waves that pushed water into the car deck until it went lower than the waterline.

Then water started flooding the cabin decks and I believe that is when the vessel started to list.

I know all about that.
My post was an attempt for Vixen to discover a few of the holes in her story, so that she could reevaluate said story.
Alas. No such luck.

 

[erwinl]

Ramming by a submarine whether Russian or Swedish is a tall story which I haven't seen perpetuated here, except as a troll (clearly people have failed to notice that the Swedish government itself, together with the Estonians, have returned to the scene to reinvestigate it). Having said that, a submarine could easily cause more than a dent on a thin metal plate of a passenger ship.

It is a confirmed news item that there are a further two long fractures in the hull. This is official. Reality. Enquiring minds want to understand why. Those who aren't interested are not obliged to follow the topic.

Ah! That is refreshingly honest of you. Thank you very much.
Now we know to read your post #27 as a troll post.

Any more of these kinds of posts of yours in this thread?

 

[Ulf Nereng]

It is true that there is even a World War II Finnish ship sunk in the water and that's where the bodies of the sailors remain. And of course all the churches around the archipelago - even Turku Cathedral - has votive model sailing ships hanging from the rafters, as donated, so this habit could go back to pagan times when seafaring accidents happened all the time and there were no lighthouses. However, be that as it may, the fact is if a loved dies in an accident on public transport, then their nearest and dearest get to request they bring the body home; unlike guys signed up to the military or cruise ship staff who understand that if they die in action in foreign seas or land, that is where their body may lay.

True, our dear Swedish cousins haven't seen any war since circa 1780 when they had a contretemps with the Norwegians, whereas the Finns and the Estonians have had the pesky bear from the east on their necks constantly, so we have to make allowances for their soft gentle ways.

"Tyttebærkrigen" in 1788! (The Lingonberry war)

Apart from a small skirmish involving about 400 Swedes who surrendered after 15 minutes of fighting there were no opposition to the Norwegian army, which marched to Gothenburg and then embarked on ships of the Danish/Norwegian navy to sail home again. Fun times for all involved!

 

[RolandRat]

I should imagine the mass killing of a thousand citizens and crew would be classified and not something for the PR guys.

Please correct me if I'm wrong but your previous comment of not believing, nor disbelieving (not sure how that works TBH) the official story seems not to be true. You seem to be insinuating that the ship was struck by another vessel or was blown up in some way.

 

[Vixen]

A sub hitting a ship hard enough to sink it would have done considerable damage to itself and ended up on the bottom alongside it.

It is all hypothetical so there is no point dwelling on it.

 

[Vixen]

I've been on a lot of boats, big, small, ferries, cruise ship, whatever and I'm very safety conscious. Sometimes there are excellent practice drills giving everyone an idea what to do in an emergency and sometimes the crew doesn't even point out where the lifejackets are. I did not get the impression the crew took the actions they could have regardless there wasn't a lot of time. Like that guy who stopped to brush his teeth, people just don't act in an emergency, crew or not. It's a kind of denial that comes over people.

Bear in mind that these boats sail literally every day and are perfectly used to stormy weather. When I was a kid we used to travel five days on a ship called the Baltica. Across the North Sea, it gets extremely rough, you are literally thrown from one side to the other, with your dinner plate following shortly after. Just because there is a violent lilt, that isn't necessarily cause for anyone to stop brushing their teeth and panic. These shipbuilders know their terrain and design their ships accordingly. When the M/S Estonia was known as Wasa King in its third reincarnation with Silja Lines, it was regarded as the most reliable ship in a storm, according to wiki, when it sailed regularly between Vaasa and Umeå.

ETA: In fact, the crew were well placed to escape, being housed near the upper decks, and having an openable window to climb out, as most of them did. In addition, they knew that making your way to the main stairs and central lobby was not an escape route and used the back and side stairs instead. Further, they knew to wear warm and heavy waterproof clothing, unlike many passengers, who assumed less clothes meant you were better able to float. So, many crew did actually manage to hand out life jackets on the upper decks.

 

[Vixen]

I've noticed. I just don't see a good reason for them to do so.


So either your vaunted Germans were incompetent and incomplete in their survey, or else the ship is continuing to settle and develop new ruptures in the hole.


I subscribe to the latter hypothesis. I'm following the topic to see if anyone comes up with a plausible explanation for why it's important to re-open the investigation.

It has been reinvestigated because under Swedish law, if new information comes to light, it is obliged to investigate the new evidence. It didn't spot the damage to the hull before and it's not included in the report, so they have to go back and check it out.

 

[Vixen]

Angels guided her gently to the seabed and have guarded the ship's condition from any deleterious effects since the incident. She is, today, in the exact same state as she was when she slipped beneath waves.

It makes perfect sense!

Well, when it sank, it landed almost face down, on a slope and on a muddy bed so it is not immediately obvious why a hole and two fissures should have appeared in the hull in the meantime. Water pressure? Maybe. Shifting around? Who knows.

 

[Vixen]

Please correct me if I'm wrong but your previous comment of not believing, nor disbelieving (not sure how that works TBH) the official story seems not to be true. You seem to be insinuating that the ship was struck by another vessel or was blown up in some way.

I was actually responding to the prestige who made a passing remark that the military issue press releases about its manoeuvres all the time, when common sense of course tells us a lot of it is secret for obvious reasons.

I don't believe the Estonia was "struck by another vessel or was blown up in some way". However, one can see that the idea that 'a wave hit the ship and the bow visor fell off, whereupon the boat immediately sank' could cause scepticism in some.

Imagine there is a plane crash and the finding is 'a gust of air caused a wing to fall off and hence it immediately crashed into a mountain'. Oh, OK. That's all right then. Nothing to see here.


The sad fact is that people do perform acts of sabotage (remember that German guy in the cockpit who brought down a plane 'because he was depressed') and I don't see anything wrong in ruling that out here. That's not to say a wave didn't make the bow visor suddenly fall off and the ship suddenly sank', as this is what it did.

 

[Vixen]

Update on the operation from the Baltic Times:

Despite the waves, the data and image quality achieved with the multibeam sonar is surprisingly good. For the night, the research mother ship EVA-316 sailed to Lehtma and Electra af Asko to the Finnish port of Hanko. At night, the data of the multibeam sonar survey were processed, and in the morning we were able to return to the site of the MS Estonia accident."

According to Arikas, the bow, keel and stern of the MS Estonia wreck are clearly distinguishable in the image created by the multibeam sonar. One can see the bridge, the deck structure, the rows of windows on the upper decks and the anchor, propeller and other details. Deformations in the middle of the hull are also visible.

"In the area around the wreck to the north of the ship, the image shows a ridge that is thought to have formed as a result of the ship's sinking," Arikas said. "There is a 5-7, at some point 10 meter wide channel between the ridge and the hull. A channel has also formed in the stern of the ship. The reason for the formation of the channels is probably that the ship has collapsed downwards from its original position towards the south and east, as it lies on a ridge made of an unstable layer of clay. A total of four smaller and larger collapses can be seen, the last of which occurred during the covering of the wreck in 1995-1996, when the entire bow and stern as well as the southern part were covered with geotextile, it was anchored with warps, covered with gravel, and nearly 300,000 cubic meters of sand was dumped on top of that. Apparently the dumping did not succeed and as a result there were collapses, which we can see today with the sonar surveys."

On Saturday, surveys of the entire area were conducted with a sub-bottom profiler. According to Arikas, the image shows a cross-section of the central part of the Estonian wreck. "From this, it can be estimated that the central part of the ship rests on a harder moraine on which the ship has stopped, and the bow and stern part on softer clay. We saw from the surveys that the middle part of the ship is rather higher and hogging has occurred. As a result, these are very likely to be deformations, which we plan to detect in more detail in the next few days."

 

[Andy_Ross]

Bear in mind that these boats sail literally every day and are perfectly used to stormy weather. When I was a kid we used to travel five days on a ship called the Baltica. Across the North Sea, it gets extremely rough, you are literally thrown from one side to the other, with your dinner plate following shortly after. Just because there is a violent lilt, that isn't necessarily cause for anyone to stop brushing their teeth and panic. These shipbuilders know their terrain and design their ships accordingly. When the M/S Estonia was known as Wasa King in its third reincarnation with Silja Lines, it was regarded as the most reliable ship in a storm, according to wiki, when it sailed regularly between Vaasa and Umeå.

Until it's bows fell off and it sank.

Ships sink all the time.

On average two large ships sink every week from all reasons

Not including those lost to fire, dragging an anchor, collision or running aground, 32 ships sank last year in storms or through flooding.

For example in March, The British-flagged tanker Lady Sandra split into two off the southeast coast of Malta after taking on water in bad weather.

In September Panama Registered Gulf Livestock 1 lost power and capsized after being hit by a wave in the Sea of Japan. Two crewmembers were rescued, 41 are missing, presumed lost.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Well, when it sank, it landed almost face down, on a slope and on a muddy bed so it is not immediately obvious why a hole and two fissures should have appeared in the hull in the meantime. Water pressure? Maybe. Shifting around? Who knows.

Because it was subject to stresses it was not designed for as it sank and is now sat on the seabed, something else it was not designed for.

 

[Vixen]

Until it's bows fell off and it sank.

Ships sink all the time.

On average two large ships sink every week from all reasons

Not including those lost to fire, dragging an anchor, collision or running aground, 32 ships sank last year in storms or through flooding.

For example in March, The British-flagged tanker Lady Sandra split into two off the southeast coast of Malta after taking on water in bad weather.

In September Panama Registered Gulf Livestock 1 lost power and capsized after being hit by a wave in the Sea of Japan. Two crewmembers were rescued, 41 are missing, presumed lost.

Re the product tanker the Lady Sandra, the Maritime Bulletin says this:

Absolutely unclear how this inland tanker got to sail in Mediterranean, and who allowed this river ship to navigate high seas, even if she was deployed for bunkering only. Crew include 2 Egyptians and 1 Romanian.

So not such a great example of 'a natural disaster what happens all the time, innit'.

 

[catsmate]

Considering the speed of sinking of the Estonia and thus the presumed amount of water entering it. At least through a hole big enough to be a stand in for the conventional theory of the broken off visor bow.
Did any of the surrounding countries find one of their objects weighing 1000 to 5000 tons missing (presumably with their entire crew), or have it return to port heavily damaged?

That would need to be one of the first questions to be answered, I’d guess.

Exactly. Collisions involving subs generally end badly for the sub.

 

[catsmate]

I confess I was quoting some guy called Anders Bjorkman, who made this point, who might well be an expert in a ship's centre of gravity and variations thereof.

Oh sweet effing jeebus no. He's a nut-case.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Re the product tanker the Lady Sandra, the Maritime Bulletin says this:




So not such a great example of 'a natural disaster what happens all the time, innit'.

But it is a a ship that split in to two and sank after taking on water.

I gave two examples. I can show a lot more of ships taking on water and sinking in rough weather and even in fairly calm weather.

 

[catsmate]

It doesn't seem likely the rule-loving Germans - master of engineering - durch vorsprung technik -would simply make all this up, though?

Nice ethnic stereotype.
And it's 'vorsprung durch technik'.

Military manoevres are hardly going to be mentioned in Aftonbladet, Expressen, Bild or the Sun by way of a press release.

Quite probably they are. Generally the military let people know to keep them away, or at a safe distance.

 

[Vixen]

Oh sweet effing jeebus no. He's a nut-case.

I realise that now. However, he is a naval architect and has a masters in the subject. Further, he was a shipping surveyor for Lloyds underwriters. You can be a 'nutter' and yet still be an expert in your field.

 

[Andy_Ross]

So he claims.

 

[Vixen]

But it is a a ship that split in to two and sank after taking on water.

I gave two examples. I can show a lot more of ships taking on water and sinking in rough weather and even in fairly calm weather.

If a ship is designed as a river boat, then of course it will come to grief in high seas.

The logic of your argument is like, 'Oh, a Ford Capri crashed on the motorway just the other day,' to explain why a multiple pile up of passenger coaches on the M6 is perfectly normal and not worthy of any further investigation.