They are part of the puzzle as to why all means of rescue appeared to have been blocked.
Ummmm,
what? Your analysis of the evidence leads you to
this conclusion?
Really?
Bear in mind, Utö, with firm solid land and civilisation (a small population, military presence, lighthouse and hotels) was just 28 miles away.
And?
Life boats not activated.
Because of the way the ship listed to starboard so dramatically and so quickly (because of the underlying imperfect beam trim, plus the simple physics related to a very large volume/mass of water on the un-compartmentalised vehicle deck).
Still can't figure this one out properly, huh? Maybe read back through this thread, and take on board what plenty of commentators - people who've forgotten more about radio communications that you could ever hope to learn and understand - have told you about this particular matter.
Nope.
By which you mean "EPIRBs being correctly released from their attachment points on the ship and floating free, once the release mechanisms were activated by water pressure as the ship sank".
Not one single instance of passengers calling their loved ones.
Yet again, you're demonstrating your gross ignorance on the subject of radio communications. By 1994 a reasonable proportion of passengers aboard the Estonia would have owned/carried a mobile phone (you'll be effusively and jingoistically proud that the Nordic region had one of the highest early uptakes of personal cellphone devices in the World).
But........ the Estonia was some 30NM from both Uto and Hanko in the time period from it first getting into trouble (ie the point where the bow visor's bottom lock failed) and the moment it sank. There was effectively no chance that mobile phones of the time - with much less powerful transceivers than present-day devices, and using the NMT standard - would have been able to connect to any base station (= cell site) on land.
And
this (and
only this) is the reason why passengers aboard the Estonia were unable to use their cellphones during the disaster that night.
The reason why crew on the Mariella and Europa were able to use their mobiles was that those ships were some 30%-50% closer to relevant land masses and base stations during the relevant time period.
The series of bangs/collision sensation/violent list at 1:00-ish when most of the passengers were in bed in their cabins, the watch on the bridge was changing, the ship was half way through its journey, was in open sea, international waters. They had zero hope of rescue.
Strangely, I seem to recall that 137 people were rescued and survived.
Had the Epirb on the starboard side come into contact with one to four metres of water when it listed - and Rockwater confirms it was hydrostatically activated - then, OK, so it still takes time for rescue to arrive but those people who had to wait until up to 07:00 - including the sole Brit - before being rescued, then the death rate amongst those who escaped the ship alone could have almost doubled to 262, by hel p being activated up to one hour earlier. That is someone's life, including children.
No. Once again, those EPIRBs were not hydrostatically
activated. You've now been told this - with ample reliable supporting evidence - probably a dozen times (or even more).
And as you've also been told plenty of times already now, in the specific instance of the Estonia sinking, the fact that the ship's EPIRBs were not (manually) activated actually made no difference whatsoever to the efficacy of the rescue efforts: the crew were able to transmit ship's true position by voice over regular radio channels well before she sank.
Oh, and your final sentence above is yet another improper attempt to inject some sort of emotional "tug" to your claims.
Real researchers/analysts never engage in that sort of stuff.
So, yes, the JAIC should have investigated in greater depth the logistics of how the EPIRBS were released from their cages yet failed to operate and how the dickens did they end up in Dirhami, West Estonia, 2 October 1994, together with a whole bunch of life vests and rafts, and how come the JAIC and the Rockwater divers omitted to even mention this.
Well, the JAIC investigation did cover off the failure of the crew to (manually) activate the EPIRBs, so I have no idea what you're talking about. And where the EPIRBs were eventually discovered simply has no bearing whatsoever upon the JAICs conclusions wrt the cause(s) of this disaster.
Vixen: every time a far more well-informed and knowledgeable person that you deals with each and every one of these issues - using a proper understanding of the science, a proper understanding of the evidence, and a proper approach to analysis/inference/conclusion - do you (metaphorically) stick your fingers in your ears? Because IMO there's more-or-less no other way to explain things.
