Cont: The Sinking of MS Estonia: Case Re-opened Part III

[Vixen]

EPIRB buoys do not transmit anything apart from an automatic mayday signal.

Do not confuse the buoys with the VHF mayday message.

It was picked up by vessels close by because it was a low power VHF signal.

Please learn something about maritime radio.

After the power failed only battery powered handsets would have been available to the Estonia.

The EPIRB buoys transmit GPS information for the International Cospas-Sarsat Programme. Yet the nearby Russian-US satellites never picked up on anything.

Channel 16 was down/weak/interfered with. If you read the transcript earlier you will see that Europa reports it was extremely weak. When Europa called back, Estonia did not reply indicating they were not receiving signals, either.

What is it you are not grasping?

 

[Disbelief]

The Baltic Sea is 377,000 km². As a comparison, England is 130,279 km².

Are you seriously claiming that a ship in distress should only expect to be heard ten kilometres away?

Stop being disingenuous.

VHF radio is line of sight, so the range will be limited no matter your incredulity.

 

[Vixen]

No. Instead of automatically activating upon sinking, they were intended to be manually activated. Another unfortunate blunder by the crew.

I've managed to glean this from the explanations people who clearly understand have posted more than once. Somehow you haven't.

No. EPIRBs are not reliant on a crew member 'remembering to switch them on' when the ship starts sinking.

 

[Jack by the hedge]

they had already sent a warning twice to MI6 and Sweden intelligence to cease smuggling FSU state secrets/space programs/military materiel using the Estonia public passenger ferry.

The Russians specifically warned Swedish intelligence not to use the Estonia for smuggling? Got a reference?

 

[LondonJohn]

Er, and Flight MH17 in 2014?

BBC

The plot (not that there was even a plot in that case) to shoot down MH17 was not cooked up in the Kremlin. The Ukrainian separatist rebels used Russian SAMs to shoot down the aircraft. That's the reason why Russia was (correctly) held to account. But Russia didn't supply those separatists with SAMs with the explicit or implicit understanding that they'd be used to shoot down civilian airliners.

Hope that clears up any confusion.

 

[Vixen]

Not sure what your point is.

Are you claiming the Russians knowingly shot down a civilian airliner, when the evidence says the Ukrainian separatists they gave the missiles to thought they shot down a Ukrainian military transport plane?

Or are you claiming the Russians sank the Estonia not realising it was a civilian vessel?

Um:

The suspects, who prosecutors plan to try under Dutch law at a court hearing beginning on 9 March 2020, are:

Igor Girkin (also known as Strelkov), a former colonel in Russia's FSB intelligence service, according to prosecutors. He was given the minister of defence title in the rebel-held eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk
Sergei Dubinsky (known as Khmury), who was employed by Russia's GRU military intelligence agency, was a deputy of Mr Girkin and was in regular contact with Russia, investigators said
Oleg Pulatov, known as Giurza, a former soldier of GRU special forces and deputy head of the intelligence service in Donetsk, according to the JIT
Leonid Kharchenko, a Ukrainian national who has no military background but led a combat unit as a commander in Eastern Ukraine, prosecutors said

BBC

 

[LondonJohn]

And you know they were never activated, how?

Because........ their signals - which would have been being transmitted (and received) had they been switched on - were never picked up.

QED

(It's really very simple to understand)

 

[Here_to_learn]

Fact is, only two nearby vessels got the signal. You need to learn more about how come.

Let's see - the exam I took to be allowed to use for example the VHF radio that sits in a charging cradle in front of me right now resulted in me holding the Short Range Certificate^WP. I wonder how they came up with that name?

 

[LondonJohn]

Really? The International Channel 16 for ships in distress 'Can only be heard by ships within a short range'?


Think before you commit to wasted broadband width.

What's "broadband width"?

(Do you perhaps mean "bandwidth"?)

 

[Jack by the hedge]

Um:

BBC

That in no way addresses what I said. The Russians gave Ukrainian separatists anti aircraft missiles and they shot down a plane, briefly celebrating what they believed to be a successful attack on a Ukrainian aircraft. Then as the truth emerged the missiles got spirited away back into Russia.

What part of that do you think indicates the Russians wanted to shoot down a civilian airliner?

 

[LondonJohn]

I indavertently wrote 'Channel 16 was an international distress signal' when I obviously meant 'channel' not signal' yet, London John thought it worth scoring a point.

You probably ought to learn what a "typo" is - and, importantly, what it is not.

If, for example, I wrote that dogs are reptiles, I cannot claim later that I'd just made a "typo", and that "of course" I'd meant to write that dogs are mammals.

 

[Vixen]

What law says you can sink a passenger ship in international waters in a way that will kill the maximum number of passengers?

Why would Sweden not have shouted about this crime if they knew about it?

Murdering all those many hundreds of people and deliberately sinking a passenger ship in international waters is a huge crime and, to be honest an act of war.

It makes claims of smuggling a few pieces of electronics pale in to insignificance.

Think about it: why would Sweden cover it up except to protect itself?

How do you know the missing Estonian crew - which included the Chief Engineer, Second Captain and Chief Medical Officer - were not disappeared to face trial in camera.

When I was on jury service, there was a 'top secret' trial going on at the same time and these are to do with national security, according to the usher.

Sweden disappeared two Egyptians in 2000 who were suspected terrorists.

 

[Andy_Ross]

The EPIRB buoys transmit GPS information for the International Cospas-Sarsat Programme. Yet the nearby Russian-US satellites never picked up on anything.

So they were never activated.

Channel 16 was down/weak/interfered with. If you read the transcript earlier you will see that Europa reports it was extremely weak. When Europa called back, Estonia did not reply indicating they were not receiving signals, either.

What is it you are not grasping?

Again, VHF Channel 16 has limited range . It was not 'down' the transmissions were picked up by nearby ships as expected.

Europa was about 10 nautical miles from Estonia, that is the expected range for a handheld VHF set.

 

[Vixen]

rigueur
Yet again you fail in trying to look clever. (You will now quote the one website that uses the misspelling)

Bravo! You spotted a typo!!!

 

[lobosrul5]

Really? The International Channel 16 for ships in distress 'Can only be heard by ships within a short range'?


Think before you commit to wasted broadband width.

Since you like wikipedia:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Channel_16_VHF

Channel 16 VHF (156.8 MHz) is a marine VHF radio frequency designated as an international distress frequency.

Now then, follow the link under "marine VHF":

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marine_VHF_radio

A marine VHF set is a combined transmitter and receiver and only operates on standard, international frequencies known as channels. Channel 16 (156.8 MHz) is the international calling and distress channel. Transmission power ranges between 1 and 25 watts, giving a maximum range of up to about 60 nautical miles (111 km) between aerials mounted on tall ships and hills, and 5 nautical miles (9 km; 6 mi) between aerials mounted on small boats at sea level.

ETA: that means the ships in that NATO training exercise that you have noted were only a few hundred miles away, could not have even heard Estonia's distress signal on Channel 16.

 

[Andy_Ross]

No. EPIRBs are not reliant on a crew member 'remembering to switch them on' when the ship starts sinking.

Those aboard the Estonia were manual operation. They relied on the crew member activating them.

Immersion operated buoys were available at the time but not so widespread and not mandatory.

 

[LondonJohn]

The Baltic Sea is 377,000 km². As a comparison, England is 130,279 km².

Are you seriously claiming that a ship in distress should only expect to be heard ten kilometres away?

Stop being disingenuous.

Let's just check:

Do you know the area of a circle with a radius of 10km?

 

[Jack by the hedge]

The EPIRBs on the Estonia were not capable of automatic (via an immersion sensor) activation. They needed to have their transmitters manually switched on by a crewmember.

No. EPIRBs are not reliant on a crew member 'remembering to switch them on' when the ship starts sinking.

What a dilemma. Whose subject knowledge to believe.

 

[Vixen]

Yes, between 10 and 40 miles depending on the antenna height and the equipment.
For example, a 25-watt marine radio will roughly have a maximum range of 30 to 40 nautical miles between antennas mounted on tall ships, but that same radio will only have a range of 5 nautical miles (9 km) between antennas mounted on small boats at sea level. Both ships have the same 25-watt radio, the difference in this example is the height of the antenna.

A battery powered handheld VHF radio has far less power than 25 watts and a small antenna so the transmission range is limited.

That is why there is also the MF emergency band for ships moving further away from the coast.
Now of course there are also satellite phones.

Ah, so now we are reluctantly squeezing it out of you: 40 miles = well within range of Utö Coast Guard, just 28 miles away and where military radar monitoring is located of all of the ships in the area, of which there were dozens.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Think about it: why would Sweden cover it up except to protect itself?

How do you know the missing Estonian crew - which included the Chief Engineer, Second Captain and Chief Medical Officer - were not disappeared to face trial in camera.

When I was on jury service, there was a 'top secret' trial going on at the same time and these are to do with national security, according to the usher.

Sweden disappeared two Egyptians in 2000 who were suspected terrorists.

If Russia deliberately sank a passenger ship of another nation in international waters and murdered many hundreds of people, what would Sweden be protecting itself from?

It would be an act of war as well as a major crime.