The Sinking of MS Estonia: Case Re-Opened

[Vixen]

'Secret Police'?

SAPO:

The National Security Service (SAPO) is Sweden's primary government intelligence service. SAPO directs maintains several operational branches, including signals intelligence, counterintelligence, and a national police force.

These were the people who interviewed the survivors for their first-hand accounts.

 

[Mojo]

That is because you have an inability to accept that these events have little to do with conspiracy theory but are recorded statements to the highest police (in Sweden and Finland, the intelligence services are linked to the police force). These witnesses were interviewed by these police in their hospital beds and as isolated from other survivors. In addition the Swedish Prosecutor was investigating as a matter of factwhether there were up to 174 illegal Kurdish refugees being people-smuggled in a lorry on the Estonia whose number plate was not registered to any driver (this investigation was dropped eventually). Just because something seems outlandish or outrageous, that doesn't make it a conspiracy theory. I think I see where you are going wrong. You think that because there was a terrible disaster one must not mention the unmentionable but try to 'keep up appearances' and pretend it was just a normal every day accident. As Captain_Swoop soothingly assures us, 'two ships sink every day' <shrug> Move on.

Nope. The appropriate thing to do is to try to identify the actual causes of accidents, and if possible to take action to reduce the prevalence of these causes. Wild speculation might be fun, but it doesn’t actually do any good.

Willium:
Russian frogmen dunnit, mate.

Seagoon:
What was their motive?

Willium:
Oo, I don't in to their private affairs, mate, I just accuses 'em, that's all I do.

Seagoon:
Are you sure the Russians did it?

Willium:
Well I 'aint, mate, but it looks good on the report sheet, dunnit?

http://www.thegoonshow.net/scripts_show.asp?title=s05e21_the_sinking_of_westminster_pier

 

[Andy_Ross]

And, as the bow visor slams shut in the face of an oncoming wave, then the car ramp is effectively completely sealed off.

and every time it slams it is stressed, and every time it moves water is allowed in.

 

[LondonJohn]

Let's get back into context. Captain_Swoop asked what evidence there was of a collision that the JAIC must have known about. I pointed out early newspaper reports and 34 eye witness passenger survivors, explaining that eyewitness testimony is considered 'direct evidence' in a court of law ceteris paribus. [Obviously, subject to being called to testify and cross-examination. It is a perfectly valid form of evidence.].

No. I already explained to you that witness testimony in criminal trials is only considered direct evidence if the person witnessed the criminal act itself being committed.

And therefore, incidentally, the witness testimony of any given passenger survivor on the Estonia would - provided it is judged to be credible and reliable (ceteris paribus ) - only serve as evidence of what the passenger heard and experienced. In other words, for example, "I heard several loud bangs". The witness would not be invited to suggest what he/she thought caused those loud bangs (assuming, as would be the case here, that the witness was not able to make an experienced judgement on what caused the bangs).

 

[LondonJohn]

How would Lehtola have known virtually straight away that the sonar image was mistaken, when a sonar image is as good as 'seeing is believing', when as of that time, it was not known 'the bow visor was missing'* and nor had divers confirmed it. So how did Lehtola 'know' the sonar image was a sundry piece of metal plate (that matched perfectly the density, shape and dimensions of the bow visor and was in its intuitively correct place, albeit several metres below the bulbous bow (now upside down)?

*Lehtola's memo showing the sonar image was issued circa 8 Oct and withdrawn circa the 9th. The bow visor was not 'found' by the Swedish/Finnish navy until 18th October. If the bow visor showed up in a sonar image why did Lehtola claim it was still missing ten days before anyone knew it was missing?

Re this: I'm thinking you probably don't know much/anything about sonar, nor that you've seen many/any sonar images before.

 

[LondonJohn]

No, the point being made is that when British citizens request the document setting out the reasons the UK signed the Estonia Treaty - a reasonable request when it is nowhere near the Baltic - those persons have the right under the FOI Act to receive that information. If it was a signed off treaty then we know that such a document must exist as it has to go before parliament.

Nope. You (and he) don't understand the situation correctly.

 

[LondonJohn]

If for argument's sake the bow visor fell off as a result of either explosives or because of a collision, then it becomes a post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacious reasoning as being the cause of the accident.

No. And in any event, what you're describing above (which, remember, is something that there's zero credible/reliable evidence to support) is very clearly not even an example of post hoc ergo propter hoc reasoning. Which makes me think you might not properly understand what the term actually means.


ETA: And if the bow visor had "fallen off" as the result of an explosive device or a collision, then there would be ample supporting evidence in either case. If explosive charges had blown the visor off, there'd be tell-tale evidence on and around the area of the visor in question. If a collision had forced the bow visor off, then - obviously - there'd have been massive visible damage at the bow end of the hull.

Instead, of course, there's no such evidence. Instead, there's evidence of exactly how and why the bow visor did break free from the ship. I can only assume that your impressive and extensive science training never touched on fields such as metallurgy and disaster/accident analysis. Because otherwise you'd already know that real-life experts in those fields can, fairly easily, tell a stress failure from a fatigue failure from an impact failure from an explosive failure.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Re this: I'm thinking you probably don't know much/anything about sonar, nor that you've seen many/any sonar images before.

Exactly, it could be a variation in water density caused by salinity or temperature variations, or even a school of fish.

 

[LondonJohn]

Get a grip, Jesse Custer. If the information is classified of course it isn't ratified in the public domain.

Absolutely classic conspiracy-theory rationalisation! Brava!!!

Or are you waiting on FOX News to tell you what you can and cannot think?

Oh dear. Oh deary deary me.

 

[LondonJohn]

That's not an image, that's bathymetric interpretation of a sonar image. Read what they said:



4 out of 50? Are these guys serious?

They're matrixing sonar clutter as the hood. That is just sad.

Yes. And sonar technology/imagery (and its limitations and issues around interpretations) is just the latest in the long list of things Vixen's posts have attempted to understand* and yet failed miserably in that attempt.


* And more than that: to pontificate, educate and advocate....

 

[LondonJohn]

Nowhere have I said witness statements should be accepted at face value. Please read carefully. I said if accepted by the court. This means turning up at the hearing and subjecting oneself to cross-examination.

No. You only started adding that in after I informed you about it.

 

[LondonJohn]

Er, did you not know about the petal-shaped hole directly opposite one of the side bolts?

Or the video taken by Rockwater divers which appears to show an unexploded 'device' on the bow bulkhead?

Neither of which is anything more than the very flimsiest of evidence to support your extraordinary and declarative claim that *reads notes* "it is pretty much a certainty that there were explosives applied to the bow bulkhead and side locks".

Any comments?

 

[LondonJohn]

So Paul Barney PhD and a Churchill prize winner that enabled him to travel around internationally as a student for his research into biome systems 'was not sufficiently intelligent' to know how to put in an FOI request, nor Graham Philips journalist?

If he/they submitted that request to the wrong department, then no. Obviously.

So he is a conspiracy theorist even though his report to the police immediately after the accident from his hospital bed suffering from one of the lowest body temperatures they had ever seen but lived to tell the tale, clearly states the following:

Oh looky! Another ridiculous appeal to emotion! Next.

Yes, Paul Barney is obviously very very stupid whilst London John on his keyboard knows better.

Last-chance saloon.

 

[LondonJohn]

Stop talking nonsense. The bow visor, according tho the JAIC had its bolts at the side snapped off 'by a few strong waves' therefor it was hanging off the atlantic lock which is the lock at the bottom meaning that if it really was banging against the ship it would have had to have done so upwards and aft and would have had virtually nothing to actually 'bang' on. There would then need to be a counter-wave moving of its own accord - which is of course laughable - to then render it forward and down, which simply did not happen as the sea cannot choose which direction it moves.

No. You don't understand the dynamics of this properly. (Just as 9/11 conspiracy theorists don't properly understand the dynamics of the collapse of the Twin Towers.)

 

[Jack by the hedge]

The official JAIC report.

Hmm. You managed to conclude that the ramp was either hardly damaged at all or torn clean off, to the exclusion of any other scenario, from the report. Amazing. Tell us how you did it.

 

[Mojo]

So where is this reference then?

Journals of the House of Commons, Session 1999-2000, page 6.

 

[Jack by the hedge]

Please read carefully. I pointed out that IF water - to a maximum 2,000 tonnes - flooded the free surface car deck, it would have rushed in with a tremendous roar as water is not only heavy but sea waves crashing is incredibly loud. For example, passengers who made it to the deck were unable to hear what other people were shouting. Yet not one single survivor relates hearing the deafening sound of water ingressing the car deck and slamming the vehicles against the sides.

Obviously they couldn't hear the noise of the water over the racket of multiple submarines ramming the ship repeatedly over fifteen minutes or so.

This is a strong contender for the dumbest thing in this benighted thread. You want to insist on a specific volume of seawater entering the deck at a specific rate and producing a specific level of noise, none of which you are in any way qualified to judge, and you insist upon this because you want to claim it must have made a very distinct sound which the witnesses did not remark upon hearing. It's pathetic. Just pathetic.

 

[Mojo]

Stop talking nonsense. The bow visor, according tho the JAIC had its bolts at the side snapped off 'by a few strong waves' therefor it was hanging off the atlantic lock which is the lock at the bottom meaning that if it really was banging against the ship it would have had to have done so upwards and aft and would have had virtually nothing to actually 'bang' on.

What’s that thing on the diagram you attached that is labelled “bulbous bow”?

 

[LondonJohn]

There was originally a request to the FCDO, which you can find here: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/ms_estonia_2

In their response to the FOI request, the FCDO said, "As the Department of the Environment, Transport and Regions had responsibility for the policy and implementation of the Agreement, you may wish to apply to one of its successor departments, perhaps most appropriately the Department for Transport, for information about the UK's reasons for accession."

So it's not a matter of submitting requests to the wrong place.

The Foreign Office actually provided a totally adequate answer, since it linked to the actual text related to the accession to the treaty (which was indeed done under the Foreign Office's aegis). It's only ongoing implementation matters that are done under the successor departments to the former DETR. And since nothing's happened in that respect since the UK acceded, there's nothing for (eg) DfT to provide.

I'd have thought that someone such as Graham Phillips, who is/was claiming to be a "journalist", should have been able to interpret this FOI response properly. I'm also more than a little surprised that someone calling themselves a "journalist" should have provided such a ludicrously flimsy pretext for questioning the rationale for the UK to have signed up to the treaty (essentially, to paraphrase: "only one UK national died in the disaster, compared with 851 people from other countries, so I can't understand what reason the UK has to be involved in this treaty").


Ahhhhhhhhhhh I now see that this "journalist" Graham Phillips (assuming that this is he, which I'd judge to be highly probable) has been banned by Twitter, has been involved in an extremely unsavoury - not to mention totally journalistically unethical - episode in Ukraine, and currently appeals to crowdfunding to finance his "truth-telling" crusade.

Now it all becomes very very clear.....

 

[LondonJohn]

Well, you'll b pleased to know that Kurm is heading a new expedition to the wreck on 18th September 2021 so at least is going to be putting his money where his mouth is. If he is on extremely shaky, speculative grounds then he will have blown €800,000 and wasted the time of experts in Singapore headed by a naval architect with a Polish name. Jasionowicz iir.

The experts will be fine with it, provided he ponies up their payment. But yeah, the poor man is almost certain to lose a lot of money on a fool's errand.