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The Sinking of MS Estonia: Case Re-opened Part II

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JayUtah said:
Cf. Captain_Swoop's links to ships being struck by various ordnance, including -- at the end -- a Mk 48 naval torpedo. You are correct in that a substantial detonation is required to heave the ship. Also, torpedoes are designed to swim under the keel of the ship and detonate there, thus causing such heave and breaking the keel. The combination of explosive charge and charge placement is required.

Also, such detonations are evinced in seismographs. No such detonations were recorded that night.
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I am a bit surprised that explosions near the surface of the ocean would show up on seismographs. Surely, it would have to be a pretty large explosion? Or am I just wet?
 
Vixen said:
No, Braidwood's point was that of course metals can reach these temperatures but highly unlikely outside of a laboratory. A standard house fire can reach 1,500°C yet steel bearings and reinforced safes will withstand it.
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Welding works by reaching high enough temperatures to met the steel.

Steel plates for ship hulls, bow doors and car ramps are cut with gas flames or plasma cutters by melting the steel.
 
Vixen said:
You say 'probably decades behind' but the Russian space programme was quite advanced.
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Sure, in 1994 their tech was a solid 1979.

We still steal their radar systems and test them down in Tonopah and the Russians and Chinese steal our anti-aircraft software. Nobody is killing civilians over this fact. Mostly because it's fun.

And Russia shared with the USA the COSPAS-SARSAT system. In any case, the point isn't to use the stuff, it is to steal their strategy and get an insight into their defence plans.
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The one good thing about the Russians is they're usually up front about their intentions, and broadcast their strategies when they conduct wargames.

Re civilian collateral: you saw at Salisbury recently, the Russians had no problem putting he lives of 250,000 people at risk just to target one guy and his daughter.
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And yet somehow none of the three victims ended up pining for the fjords.


In WWII it had no problem bringing down the Swedish merchant ship Hansa even though it had been painted white to convey it was non-military (the Soviet motivation was to stop iron ore from reaching Germany).
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The RAF and US 8th Air Force flattened Hanover, Hamburg, Colon, Frankfurt, and Dresden. The USAF fire-bombed all the major cities in Japan, AND dropped two atomic bombs. It's called WAR, and awful things are often done.

There was no war in 1994. The Russians were in no condition to risk starting one. If they wanted to "send a message" they would have seized the Estonia with surface vessels, and took her to a Russian port where the stolen goods would have been recovered and the guilty parties paraded in front of the news cameras. That was and IS how Russia deals with this kind of thing.
 
LondonJohn said:
From the ship transitioning from the lowest point of ocean swell to the highest point of ocean swell*? Just maybe?


* A transition which might easily, on this night and in this storm, have resulted in the ship rising by as much as 6-7 metres in as little as a couple of seconds.
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Posted before but here is HMS Sirius heading in to a sea.
It is only a short film but a good illustration of heading in to waves at high speed.
If you don't match your speed to the conditions you amplify the motion.

Sometimes you have to do it and a Leander frigate was built for it.

If you keep it up for too long you will damage something, either the hull or the prop shafts and engines.

And this isn't even particularly rough

 
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Vixen said:
Erm, you think it is normal to load the stolen military equipment of a hostile foreign power onto a passenger ferry?

Suppose MI5 ordered London Transport to carry smuggled out ISIS materiel and equipment on the tube?

Especially when you know someone is bound to tip them off.

"Shut gob, pin back lug'oles and put t'brain in gear" ~ Yorkshire homily
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OK, let’s see how we got here, as you have clearly forgotten.

You have been arguing that the Estonia was sunk by the Russians in order to “send a message” to whoever was smuggling either Russian secrets or Russian military equipment, and that this was then covered up by the Swedish government.

We then get this little exchange:
Vixen said:
Think about it. Person A is carrying stolen military equipment of a foreign state on his passenger coach. The coach is sabotaged after several warnings by that foreign power to cease and desist. People get hurt.

Question: is Person A vicariously liable for putting his passengers' safety at risk?

If your loved one was one of the passengers would you consider suing Person A or is the fault 100% the foreign power?
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Captain_Swoop said:
Why not just grab the person doing the carrying?
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Vixen said:
What if Person A happens to be your own government?
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You are clearly suggesting that the ship was sunk by agents of the government that was doing the smuggling. We then get, as a response to my query about that:
Vixen said:
Was it stealing its own secrets? In any case, Yeltsin had no idea what the intelligence services were up to half the time.
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I then asked why the Swedish government would want to cover that up, and we come to your irrelevant post to which I am now replying.

I ask again: why would the Swedish government cover up something that was done by the Russian intelligence services as a result of smuggling by the Russian government?
 
phiwum said:
I am a bit surprised that explosions near the surface of the ocean would show up on seismographs. Surely, it would have to be a pretty large explosion? Or am I just wet?
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Doesn't greatly surprise me, though I don't know much about seismology. Seems to me it's a matter of how much of the compression wave's energy passes into the seabed rather than reflecting off. The high density of the water probably helps that because it's a closer match to the seabed compared to an explosion in air transferring energy into the ground.
 
Ah, this thread is the gift that keeps on giving!

Vixen has her performance down to a fine art by now, where repeated self-contradiction is merely a hand wave away from dismissal and intentional fabrication of quotes is a standard tool of the trade.

I think it's time for a re-cap. Estonia was sunk by:
  • A minisub setting a limpet mine
  • a sub colliding with it, with or without the minisub's participation
  • from nuclear materials invoking a "chemical reaction" on the bow, causing it to weaken
  • assisted by explosives
  • whilst at least three foreign intelligence serviice had operatives running around the place, tatoooing people so they could shoot them
  • whilst Russia cunningly block the distress freqeuncy in such a way that it happened for over a month in a non-specific way
  • with exploisves that are either behave in known ways or in unusual ways, depending on whether it supports an argument
 
Vixen said:
No dumber than someone who thinks applying a welding tool to solid steel will melt it.
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Um, that is how welding works. How did your fevered imagination invent how welding works? Or what welding even is?

You have dropped some clangers in your time but holy crapl
 
Kid Eager said:
Ah, this thread is the gift that keeps on giving!

Vixen has her performance down to a fine art by now, where repeated self-contradiction is merely a hand wave away from dismissal and intentional fabrication of quotes is a standard tool of the trade.

I think it's time for a re-cap. Estonia was sunk by:
  • A minisub setting a limpet mine
  • a sub colliding with it, with or without the minisub's participation
  • from nuclear materials invoking a "chemical reaction" on the bow, causing it to weaken
  • assisted by explosives
  • whilst at least three foreign intelligence serviice had operatives running around the place, tatoooing people so they could shoot them
  • whilst Russia cunningly block the distress freqeuncy in such a way that it happened for over a month in a non-specific way
  • with exploisves that are either behave in known ways or in unusual ways, depending on whether it supports an argument
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Russian Spetsnaz running around planting bombs, shooting captains and dragging mines into the ferries path. A submarine crewed by British, Swedish and Russian sailors ramming the ferry. Crew members onboard opening the bow doors and pushing a truck out. Stolen military equipment leaking enough radiation to melt through the bow door hinges. With Israel, USA and Palestine standing on the sidelines doing something or other.
 
If any of the components are cast or forged they will have been quite hot too.
 
I found out jet fuel cannot melt steel thanks to Rosie O'Donnell, now I learn from Vixen that welding torches can't either. Guess steel comes out of the ground in the exact shape engineers need them to be, and are superglued together?
 
Additional point will be awarded for correctly identifying the other methods that cause steel hardening through lamellar crystal formation.
 
Vixen said:
Oh. yes. I. am. Let that stick in your craw.
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Secondary school science teacher here, and also a former accountant. You are not a scientist. The fact that you might practice a discipline with the word "science" in its name doesn't make you a scientist, as the word is commonly understood by the overwhelming majority of native English speakers.
 
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