The Sinking of MS Estonia: Case Re-Opened

[Delphic Oracle]

That is part four of the scenario as claimed by the JAIC report:

1. Some large waves hit the bow visor (which was deemed sea worthy but of poor design)
2. The bow visor came loose and flapped about creating bangs
3. As it finally fell off, thanks to the waves, it took the car ramp with it, pulling it open.
4. there was an ingress of 2,000 tonnes of seawater - whether gradual or immediate
5. it was this that caused the ship to 'capsize' and sink.

If the car ramp came away then there would be a massive rush of seawater to fill the capacity.

My understanding is the bow visor is what "came away", not the ramp.

Why would it be sudden if the car ramp is located above the waterline?

ETA: It has been repeatedly explained that lapping waves in heavy seas first battered the ramp, then brought the water in once the ramp was compromised.

This and many other examples of your lack of comprehension of the timeline grow more and more apparent.

Another example being that passengers on the lowest deck noticing the presence of water couldn't ascend with the ship at a heavy list even though it is quite apparent that a few inches of water in the lowest deck wouldn't result in a heavy list at that time.

You're trying to resolve the actual events that occurred with your fantasy submarine ramming. Or explosives. Or radioactive...something. This produces endless confusion.

Pick one narrative, please.

 

[Vixen]

My understanding is the bow visor is what "came away", not the ramp.

Why would it be sudden if the car ramp is located above the waterline?

ETA: It has been repeatedly explained that lapping waves in heavy seas first battered the ramp, then brought the water in once the ramp was compromised.

This and many other examples of your lack of comprehension of the timeline grow more and more apparent.

Another example being that passengers on the lowest deck noticing the presence of water couldn't ascend with the ship at a heavy list even though it is quite apparent that a few inches of water in the lowest deck wouldn't result in a heavy list at that time.

You're trying to resolve the actual events that occurred with your fantasy submarine ramming. Or explosives. Or radioactive...something. This produces endless confusion.

Pick one narrative, please.

Of course the car ramp has t be above the waterline, if only to roll-on and roll-off.

The bow visor pulling down the ramp, is the JAIC version of it, as the ramp is taller than the bow, so some kind of rest was built-in that included the bow visor mechanism. As the view on the monitors showed the car ramp up, with water coming in at the sides, it is not clear how Sillaste and Treu knew that the bow visor was missing. This matter was later resolved by the JAIC stating in the third person summing up that they 'saw' the 'bow visor was missing' presumably from the safety of their life raft, snugly kitted out in their survival suits.

The JAIC at turns says the bow visor coming loose let to a deformation at the top of the car ramp allowing a metre gap through which sea water flooded and in other places that the car amp came open with the bow visor falling off, due to the lifting and lowering mechanisms being linked to the car ramp head. As the bow visor 'poor design' is the only possible cause the JAIC even looked at, then it is no surprise it is confusing, when so many survivors (29) claim to have heard or felt a collision or an explosion before the 45° list.

Blaming me for the confusion is rather silly as I didn't write the JAIC report and nor did I have any input into what the survivors related.

As for the explosions: this is the view of the German Expert Group, not my theory.

As for being rammed by a submarine: this is the view of the former Estonian State Prosecutor. Fact is, the appointed head of the JAIC, Andi Meister (Estonia) resigned in protest at the direction of the Swedish dominated committee.

So, you see, it is not my conspiracy theory or fantasy but rather, a strange insistence by some posters that somehow, the Germans and Estonians must be deluded, when the Swedish government as a matter of fact admitted it did use the ferry to smuggle Soviet military stuff during Sept 1994.

I think people need to understand how to differentiate between theory and fact. Professor Amdahl calculating that the velocity needed to cause the type of hole highlighted in Henrik Evertsson's documentary - which led to the review in July 2021 - as needing X many joules, as an expert in marine collisions, is a matter of fact not fantasy.

 

[Axxman300]

Think about it. The JAIC report used a psychologist to edit the witness testimonies. So now we have the crew systematically linking the bangs to the bow visor supposedly flapping in the wind or bouncing about with loud metal clashing against metal. But wait! The bow visor is just 55 tonnes. The vessel is 18,000 tonnes, loaded. Just 0.004% of its total mass. First, the bow visor having fallen off immediately sinks. It doesn't form a buoyant bowl and float because of its triangular shape. One side will let in water as it has no rim, so it sinks.

Secondly, the passengers 130 metres away from the bow at the stern, where the cafeteria was, where people without cabins camped down for the night certainly could not describe any clash of the bow visor on the ship's bow as 'an explosion' or 'a collision' (unless of course there was an explosion at the bow as claimed by the German Expert Group, and this is what Linde and Sillaste refer to when they changed watch and claim to have heard the noise at the bow), as 55 tonnes against 18,000 tonnes would not be particularly loud. More like someone knocking on the door.

Thirdly, it was a gale force storm either Beaufort 7 or 9, depending on which report. However, it hadn't yet reached the worst of the storm, which was further on. Whether it was force 7 or force 9, there is no way a loose bow visor could have been flapping as that type if wind howling towards the northeast, as a southwesterly, is almost directly contra - or about 40° - against the ship travelling in a northwesterly direction, at its port, so anything loose will not be flapping but will be either slammed tight against the body of the vessel unmoving and jammed shut, or it will be in one straight line in the direction of the wind. A gale force wind is not a breeze when you can hang your clothes out and they flap about in the wind to dry. So no, the bow visor cannot have been flapping against the ship to create the bangs that people reported. I'll grant it was ingenious of the JAIC to try to create a link between this and the many reports from survivors of two or three loud bangs that caused the ship to shudder and scrape and then lurch violently towards starboard.

Ilta Sanomat 2019

You need to get out more.

Working backward, your attempt to downplay the storm, the wind, and the waves is embarrassing. The Estonia's heading put the bow mostly into the wind coming from the port side...along with the waves. That first loud bang was a wave crashing into the bow, fracturing the clamp at the base of the cover. If you look at the map, the Estonia was in an area ripe for rogue waves under the right conditions based on the bathymetry of the Baltic Sea. The wind blew from the south-west over a long fetch both above water and the sea floor, which is mostly flat. Where the Estonia was struck was in a region where the sea floor becomes rugged, and with the wind driving the waves across a relatively shallow stretch the sudden rise in the sea floor in some locations will force the wave up to break. And since it had a nice long fetch that wave will be nice and big.

https://os.copernicus.org/articles/15/905/2019/

Second, at no point has anyone described the bow-cover as "flapping" in the wind. The bow-cover, once loose, was beaten by waves until all the bolts failed.

Third, a ship like the Estonia was a metal tube. Steel on steel is going to be loud no matter where you are.

Fourth, nobody knows what the bow-cover did in the seconds after it broke free from the ship. I would point out that in rough seas the bow-cover would not behaved predictably.

Finally, there were no explosives used on the Estonia. I'm no expert, but if the Bismarck and Hood still have scorch marks from the explosive shell strikes of 80 years ago then any blast damage on the civilian Estonia will stand out like a lighthouse.

 

[erwinl]

Of course the car ramp has t be above the waterline, if only to roll-on and roll-off.

The bow visor pulling down the ramp, is the JAIC version of it, as the ramp is taller than the bow, so some kind of rest was built-in that included the bow visor mechanism. As the view on the monitors showed the car ramp up, with water coming in at the sides, it is not clear how Sillaste and Treu knew that the bow visor was missing. This matter was later resolved by the JAIC stating in the third person summing up that they 'saw' the 'bow visor was missing' presumably from the safety of their life raft, snugly kitted out in their survival suits.

The JAIC at turns says the bow visor coming loose let to a deformation at the top of the car ramp allowing a metre gap through which sea water flooded and in other places that the car amp came open with the bow visor falling off, due to the lifting and lowering mechanisms being linked to the car ramp head. As the bow visor 'poor design' is the only possible cause the JAIC even looked at, then it is no surprise it is confusing, when so many survivors (29) claim to have heard or felt a collision or an explosion before the 45° list.

Blaming me for the confusion is rather silly as I didn't write the JAIC report and nor did I have any input into what the survivors related.

As for the explosions: this is the view of the German Expert Group, not my theory.

As for being rammed by a submarine: this is the view of the former Estonian State Prosecutor. Fact is, the appointed head of the JAIC, Andi Meister (Estonia) resigned in protest at the direction of the Swedish dominated committee.

So, you see, it is not my conspiracy theory or fantasy but rather, a strange insistence by some posters that somehow, the Germans and Estonians must be deluded, when the Swedish government as a matter of fact admitted it did use the ferry to smuggle Soviet military stuff during Sept 1994.

I think people need to understand how to differentiate between theory and fact. Professor Amdahl calculating that the velocity needed to cause the type of hole highlighted in Henrik Evertsson's documentary - which led to the review in July 2021 - as needing X many joules, as an expert in marine collisions, is a matter of fact not fantasy.

Highlighted
I hear a sound.

As if millions of irony meters suddenly cried out in terror and then were silenced.

 

[Andy_Ross]

The water began coming in after the initial impact with the wave. The bow cover hadn't been ripped off yet. The crewman reported it to the bridge but their' idea of "inspecting the damage" was to look at video monitors. Nobody went down to survey anything. By the time the bow-cover came off there was already a lot of water in the car deck, thus when people woke up to the louder bang the ship was already listing.

I have seen nothing to change the basic explanation of the Estonia's sinking.

If the crew were used to operating with water coming in the bow to the extent they had materials around it to absorb the water, why should they have been worried by water coming in the bow?

It It is not the usual operating condition for the bow visor. It should have been reported and the company should have taken steps to have it properly examined and fixed.

A case of 'familiarity breeds contempt'

 

[Andy_Ross]

Not the fuel. The Finnish environmental agency SYKE demanded that the fuel be removed as it would pollute protected waters. They even had to visit the Swedish government in person and demand it be permitted for them to do so. The Swedes did not want anybody to go down there but themselves, so the Finns devised a method of robotic magnets on to the ships tanks and a guided hose to syphon off the fuel. Lehtola tried to pressurise the divers to take radioactivity readings of the wreck, which failed twice because of the conditions. Presumably for his own curiosity as he was only a lawyer, after all, and the JAIC was now closed.

How else would they get the fuel out?

Why would a radioactivity test fail 'because of the conditions'?

What were the conditions?

What 'test' did they perform?

 

[Andy_Ross]

Think about it. The JAIC report used a psychologist to edit the witness testimonies. So now we have the crew systematically linking the bangs to the bow visor supposedly flapping in the wind or bouncing about with loud metal clashing against metal. But wait! The bow visor is just 55 tonnes. The vessel is 18,000 tonnes, loaded. Just 0.004% of its total mass. First, the bow visor having fallen off immediately sinks. It doesn't form a buoyant bowl and float because of its triangular shape. One side will let in water as it has no rim, so it sinks.

Secondly, the passengers 130 metres away from the bow at the stern, where the cafeteria was, where people without cabins camped down for the night certainly could not describe any clash of the bow visor on the ship's bow as 'an explosion' or 'a collision' (unless of course there was an explosion at the bow as claimed by the German Expert Group, and this is what Linde and Sillaste refer to when they changed watch and claim to have heard the noise at the bow), as 55 tonnes against 18,000 tonnes would not be particularly loud. More like someone knocking on the door.

Thirdly, it was a gale force storm either Beaufort 7 or 9, depending on which report. However, it hadn't yet reached the worst of the storm, which was further on. Whether it was force 7 or force 9, there is no way a loose bow visor could have been flapping as that type if wind howling towards the northeast, as a southwesterly, is almost directly contra - or about 40° - against the ship travelling in a northwesterly direction, at its port, so anything loose will not be flapping but will be either slammed tight against the body of the vessel unmoving and jammed shut, or it will be in one straight line in the direction of the wind. A gale force wind is not a breeze when you can hang your clothes out and they flap about in the wind to dry. So no, the bow visor cannot have been flapping against the ship to create the bangs that people reported. I'll grant it was ingenious of the JAIC to try to create a link between this and the many reports from survivors of two or three loud bangs that caused the ship to shudder and scrape and then lurch violently towards starboard.

Ilta Sanomat 2019

You just make it up as you go along don't you?

55 tons hammering up and down against the hull will be heard through the ship.

It would not 'flap' with the wind. It would be moved by the sea. it pivots from the top.
If the fastenings failed the bottom of the visor would be moving up and down in an arc. It would be slamming open and closed before the pivots sheared.

Tow or three loud bangs as the visor was forced open and closed by weight of the sea as the ship rode up one wave and plunged in to the next.
Every opening of the visor would admit water.

Have you never watched a ship butting in to a head sea?

 

[Andy_Ross]

That is part four of the scenario as claimed by the JAIC report:

1. Some large waves hit the bow visor (which was deemed sea worthy but of poor design)
2. The bow visor came loose and flapped about creating bangs
3. As it finally fell off, thanks to the waves, it took the car ramp with it, pulling it open.
4. there was an ingress of 2,000 tonnes of seawater - whether gradual or immediate
5. it was this that caused the ship to 'capsize' and sink.

If the car ramp came away then there would be a massive rush of seawater to fill the capacity.

As the ship plunged off the top of a wave in to the trough and hit the next one water would be scooped in to the car deck.
After the ship started to list the inrush would be continuous as the waterline would then be at the level of the car deck on the lower side.

 

[Andy_Ross]

I was in a ten-car pile up and I know it must have been caused by my car side mirror, as it fell off. The collision I felt was the wind hitting the side mirror's welding causing it to come off and making the collision sound I felt and heard.

I'll run that past my car insurance company...

It was Russian spies that used explosives to blow your mirror off, then they rammed you with their car.

Why are you trying to cover it up?

Are you seriously trying to equate the side mirror on a car with the bows of a ship coming loose?

How about something more appropriate like your car bonnet popping open and smashing back in to the windscreen?
the bonnet of the car is probably nearer the ratio weight wise that you are looking for.

 

[GlennB]

Thirdly, it was a gale force storm either Beaufort 7 or 9, depending on which report. However, it hadn't yet reached the worst of the storm, which was further on. Whether it was force 7 or force 9, there is no way a loose bow visor could have been flapping as that type if wind howling towards the northeast, as a southwesterly, is almost directly contra - or about 40° - against the ship travelling in a northwesterly direction, at its port, so anything loose will not be flapping but will be either slammed tight against the body of the vessel unmoving and jammed shut, or it will be in one straight line in the direction of the wind. A gale force wind is not a breeze when you can hang your clothes out and they flap about in the wind to dry. So no, the bow visor cannot have been flapping against the ship to create the bangs that people reported.

I haven't read such a pile of pseudo-scientific bilge since the bad old days of the 9/11 CT forum. Vixen, check out a YouTube video of trees in a storm. They sway wildly and are not magically pinned into a bent position by the gale or hurricane.

A few seconds of the YT below will suffice -

 

[Andy_Ross]

I haven't read such a pile of pseudo-scientific bilge since the bad old days of the 9/11 CT forum. Vixen, check out a YouTube video of trees in a storm. They sway wildly and are not magically pinned into a bent position by the gale or hurricane.

A few seconds of the YT below will suffice -

Well, the bow visor wasn't being blown around by the wind anyway.

 

[GlennB]

Well, the bow visor wasn't being blown around by the wind anyway.

Vixen seems to be claiming it was pinned shut by (a component of) the force of the headwind.

 

[Vixen]

You need to get out more.

Working backward, your attempt to downplay the storm, the wind, and the waves is embarrassing. The Estonia's heading put the bow mostly into the wind coming from the port side...along with the waves. That first loud bang was a wave crashing into the bow, fracturing the clamp at the base of the cover. If you look at the map, the Estonia was in an area ripe for rogue waves under the right conditions based on the bathymetry of the Baltic Sea. The wind blew from the south-west over a long fetch both above water and the sea floor, which is mostly flat. Where the Estonia was struck was in a region where the sea floor becomes rugged, and with the wind driving the waves across a relatively shallow stretch the sudden rise in the sea floor in some locations will force the wave up to break. And since it had a nice long fetch that wave will be nice and big.

https://os.copernicus.org/articles/15/905/2019/

Second, at no point has anyone described the bow-cover as "flapping" in the wind. The bow-cover, once loose, was beaten by waves until all the bolts failed.

Third, a ship like the Estonia was a metal tube. Steel on steel is going to be loud no matter where you are.

Fourth, nobody knows what the bow-cover did in the seconds after it broke free from the ship. I would point out that in rough seas the bow-cover would not behaved predictably.

Finally, there were no explosives used on the Estonia. I'm no expert, but if the Bismarck and Hood still have scorch marks from the explosive shell strikes of 80 years ago then any blast damage on the civilian Estonia will stand out like a lighthouse.

I like your elegant argument of bathymetry. I did mention in an earlier post that seas, being relatively shallow, did have more wave activity than say, an ocean, but Captain Swoop slapped me down and said the North Atlantic was far rougher than anything the Baltic could provide.

The issue with the uneven sea bed doesn't really start happening until you get to the archipelgo, where these ro-ros have a habit of getting stuck on shallow banks in narrow passages between islands . However, the Estonia hadn't reached the archipelago as of that point. In addition, these sudden changes in current underwater arising from the seabed changing suddenly from 30, to 300m, as the Baltic does in some parts, is more of a problem for submarines, as one or two Russian subs snooping around have discovered.

The waves on 28 Sept 1994 are estimated to have been 6m - 8m high. The Estonia in its various different names had made at least 300 crossings over the Baltic and in far worse weather than that, so I can't see there was any one wave that was particularly strong that it could unhinge an atlantic lock plus loosen the two side locks and bolts, and the two hydraulic arms. Poor maintenance in theory might leave them vulnerable.

 

[Vixen]

How else would they get the fuel out?

Why would a radioactivity test fail 'because of the conditions'?

What were the conditions?

What 'test' did they perform?

It was to do with the diving conditions at the time. Poor visibility and only a couple of opportunities.

Well, it was possible to assess the radioactivity levels of the Kursk lying in the Barents sea and another, the Komsomolets deep in the Norwegian Sea, so clearly it can be measured.

Norway has found a radiation level 800,000 times higher than normal at the wreck of a Russian navy submarine.

The Komsomolets sank in the Norwegian Sea in 1989 after a fire on board killed 42 sailors.

A sample showed radioactive caesium leaking from a ventilation pipe, but researchers said it was "not alarming", as the Arctic water quickly diluted it.

The Soviet-era sub is also deep down, at 1,680m (5,512ft), and there are few fish in the area, they added.

wiki

Of course, these were nuclear submarines carrying warheads. However, you can see why Lehtola was concerned about possible pollution if smuggling was going on, on that ferry. Question is, why didn't he use his authority to test the wreck whilst he was leading the JAIC for Finland?

 

[Vixen]

You just make it up as you go along don't you?

55 tons hammering up and down against the hull will be heard through the ship.

It would not 'flap' with the wind. It would be moved by the sea. it pivots from the top.
If the fastenings failed the bottom of the visor would be moving up and down in an arc. It would be slamming open and closed before the pivots sheared.

Tow or three loud bangs as the visor was forced open and closed by weight of the sea as the ship rode up one wave and plunged in to the next.
Every opening of the visor would admit water.

Have you never watched a ship butting in to a head sea?

Even if that were so, the noise of a creaking visor would not be the same as for an explosion and nor would it feel like a collision for those passengers situated in the bar and the cafe.

If you read the JAIC you discover that you are the one making things up. Their version is that the thing was hanging on by the atlantic lock, i.e., the big lock at the bottom of the visor and in the centre, therefore it was not banging up and down as the visor would have been hanging out of its hydraulic arms and supported by that one big lock.

If the wind was southwesterly and the ship was travelling northwesterly, the waves could not have been 'head on'.

 

[Reformed Offlian]

Even if that were so, the noise of a creaking visor would not be the same as for an explosion and nor would it feel like a collision for those passengers situated in the bar and the cafe.

If you read the JAIC you discover that you are the one making things up. Their version is that the thing was hanging on by the atlantic lock, i.e., the big lock at the bottom of the visor and in the centre, therefore it was not banging up and down as the visor would have been hanging out of its hydraulic arms and supported by that one big lock.

If the wind was southwesterly and the ship was travelling northwesterly, the waves could not have been 'head on'.

You sure about that? Figure 13.6 shows the visor swinging up and down. Being attached in the middle leaves it free to seesaw back and forth. Which would result in it rocking up and down.

 

[Andy_Ross]

I like your elegant argument of bathymetry. I did mention in an earlier post that seas, being relatively shallow, did have more wave activity than say, an ocean, but Captain Swoop slapped me down and said the North Atlantic was far rougher than anything the Baltic could provide.

The issue with the uneven sea bed doesn't really start happening until you get to the archipelgo, where these ro-ros have a habit of getting stuck on shallow banks in narrow passages between islands . However, the Estonia hadn't reached the archipelago as of that point. In addition, these sudden changes in current underwater arising from the seabed changing suddenly from 30, to 300m, as the Baltic does in some parts, is more of a problem for submarines, as one or two Russian subs snooping around have discovered.

The waves on 28 Sept 1994 are estimated to have been 6m - 8m high. The Estonia in its various different names had made at least 300 crossings over the Baltic and in far worse weather than that, so I can't see there was any one wave that was particularly strong that it could unhinge an atlantic lock plus loosen the two side locks and bolts, and the two hydraulic arms. Poor maintenance in theory might leave them vulnerable.

Atlantic storms make the Baltic look like a paddling pool.

Don't you think that over a decade of hammering in to storms would have stressed the bow visor?

We have been over this at great length already.

 

[ferd burfle]

Think about it. The JAIC report used a psychologist to edit the witness testimonies. So now we have the crew systematically linking the bangs to the bow visor supposedly flapping in the wind or bouncing about with loud metal clashing against metal. But wait! The bow visor is just 55 tonnes. The vessel is 18,000 tonnes, loaded. Just 0.004% of its total mass. First, the bow visor having fallen off immediately sinks. It doesn't form a buoyant bowl and float because of its triangular shape. One side will let in water as it has no rim, so it sinks.

Using your figures, it is 0.31%, not 0.004%. Reminds me of when you presented an explosive detonation velocity as a force. When you repeatedly get basics like this wrong it casts doubt on the rest of your many alternative narratives.

 

[Andy_Ross]

If they were heading NW and the waves were SW they would e driving on to the starboard bow. That would result in the ship rolling as well as plunging into the waves.
It would also mean the stress on the bow was uneven.

 

[Jack by the hedge]

Sorry, Axxman300 but this made me laugh so hard, tears came to my eyes.

Share the joke then.