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

[Andy_Ross]

Oceanos did not sink because of flooding.

then how did it sink if it didn't flood?

Wiki

There was an explosion via the ventilator pipes, which led to flooding in the engine room, which is a breach of its hull.

According to JAIC there was no hull breach of the Estonia. This is what the current affairs expeditions are investigating, i.e., the hole in the starboard.

So it did sink due to flooding?

How long did it take to sink? if it was an explosion and a 'breach in the hull' shouldn't it have gone down like a stone in around 35 minutes?

 

[Andy_Ross]

They say it was not compliant. They explain in what way it was not compliant. They explain that this defect was not noted when the ship was surveyed and they explain why.

It's ironic that if noticed and an exemption applied for it could have been certified and would still have sunk.

Which tells us that a certificate of 'seaworthiness' does not mean your ship won't have failures or can't sink.

 

[Axxman300]

If your car was in an accident, the police would certainly want to know if it was roadworthy. In the accident report it will state whether or not your vehicle was roadworthy (passed its MOT), thus Person B can't come along and claim it was not in a fit state for the road.

How the CHP does it in fatal accidents is they check the service records for the car, and their mechanics inspect, and in some cases dismantle components.

To underline how worthless this analogy is, NOBODY has their car inspected by state officials every day, or every week, or even every month.

You are trying to defend a stupid line of reason.

 

[abaddon]

Oceanos did not sink because of flooding.

But neither did Estonia, according to your wild claims. Are you now claiming that Estonia DID sink due to flooding?

Besides, ALL ships that sink are flooded.

 

[Vixen]

I wasn't asking about Ian Wright's brainpower as you well know. Stop deflecting. Answer the questions and stop being a coward.

So are you saying that if Ian Wright made fundamental errors regarding understanding of the game of football you would still consider him an expert?

What if we divorce this from a real person. Let's say that the BBC hire a new pundit, John Smith. John goes on MOTD and confidently discusses the play of the 12th and 13th players (not meaning subs) and talks about how he was confused that the goalkeeper, after making a simple catch, did not run with the ball to the opposition goal with the ball in his hands.

Would you consider him to be a reliable expert on football? What if he was an ex England international with 75 caps and a dozen goals?

You do understand the question I'm asking here right? You're not stupid so you must understand what my point is. I'm asking you if an expert who makes pronouncements that absolutely fly in the face of the supposed expertise they have can still be considered a reliable expert.

ETA: Let's make it really really simple. Say that there was a man called John Smith who got a medical licence 20 years ago. Proper medical licence , able to call himself Dr John Smith MD and everything. Then let's say John comes here and starts talking about how germs aren't real, that disease is caused by an imbalance of the humours and demonic possession, and that everything can be cured by holding your breath and kissing a piece of coal.

Is John Smith still a credible expert on medicine?

Obviously not but your desperate attempt to paint Bjorkman as being like some idiot who doesn't know what he is talking about re Estonia doesn't work, as from what I see, his analysis and explanations are perfectly sound, conservative and not at all controversial.

OTOH I am sure he is a pesky obstreperous git who rubbed people up the wrong way. Doesn't cancel out his knowledge.

 

[Axxman300]

Even the JAIC had to concede this would not be enough to capsize the ship.

The ship sailed with a list. It was already in trouble.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Obviously not but your desperate attempt to paint Bjorkman as being like some idiot who doesn't know what he is talking about re Estonia doesn't work, as from what I see, his analysis and explanations are perfectly sound, conservative and not at all controversial.

OTOH I am sure he is a pesky obstreperous git who rubbed people up the wrong way. Doesn't cancel out his knowledge.

How do you know? His analysis and explanations for everything else are ******* crazy! How can you tell when he is 'perfectly sound'?

 

[Vixen]

The JAIC doesn't say that the Estonia couldn't fly either.

Non-sequitur.

The fact of whether Estonia was fit for purpose was the JAIC's remit.

 

[Vixen]

And what do you imagine is the significance of that distinction? The diver gets two transducers - one per ear. The substance of your fantasy claim is that they got fed different audio in each ear but that is contradicted by the information Captain_Swoop posted and from which you yourself plucked a diagram and posted it here today.


Nonsequitur.


Nice fantasy, but we have already established that the diver's equipment only supplies one audio feed to the diver. There isn't a crafty extra circuit available for the Swedish government to whisper in his other ear. Nor for the Swedish police to whisper in a third ear or the Swedish military to whisper in a fourth.

It's not clear what you think was especially hazardous about the divers going down to deck 5, considering that the wreck is lying on its side. I assume you just flung that in there to make it seem suspicious without thinking it through.

The divers, by the way, were commissioned to inspect the interior of the ship by the Swedish Maritime Administration. They were also commissioned by the JAIC to inspect the bridge and the bow area. It's all in the report.

8.4 Diving Investigation
https://onse.fi/estonia/chapt08_1.html#4

So why was retrieving an attaché case important but not identifying whether Andresson was on the bridge or not? And if not, then who was?

 

[Andy_Ross]

Non-sequitur.

The fact of whether Estonia was fit for purpose was the JAIC's remit.

No, establishing the cause of the sinking was their remit.
Part of that involves the condition of the ship when it sailed and it's design, construction, operational history, record of maintenance, inspection and certification.
They cover this at length in Chapter 3.

Have you actually read the report?

All of Chapter 18 is concerned with compliance with collision bulkhead requirements

From section 18.3 The role of the administration

https://onse.fi/estonia/chapt18.html
The Finnish Maritime Administration was, according to a national decree, originally issued in 1920 (3.6.4), exempted from carrying out a hull survey as part of the basis for issuing the passenger ship safety certificate, if a vessel had a valid class certificate. The Administration did not therefore survey the hull construction during the building of the ESTONIA.The Bureau Veritas regulations for the initial hull survey included compliance with all applicable requirements specified in the rules of the society and valid at the time. These rules did not include requirements for an upper extension of the collision bulkhead, and hence no reference to the position of such an extension.
According to the Finnish Administration, the problem concerning the deviation of the ramp location from the SOLAS requirement for an upper extension of the collision bulkhead was not known to its inspectors.Anyhow, according to the same information, the Administration would have accepted the deviation in line with previous practice, applied also by the Swedish Maritime Administration.
The Commission has noted that full responsibility for enforcing compliance with the Conventions nevertheless, according to SOLAS, remains with the Administration. The Commission has also noted that the unrestricted right of the Finnish Maritime Administration to rely on classification society hull surveys in this respect was withdrawn in the new decree on surveys of ships issued in 1983.
It seems obvious to the Commission that the interpretation of the SOLAS Convention's collision bulkhead regulations common at the time did not ensure satisfactory compliance with applicable rules and made it possible to design the ESTONIA in a way which may have contributed to her capsizal. The Commission finds it unacceptable that practice is developed that makes it possible to deviate from a Convention with no documentation or exemptions in the certificate.

 

[MarkCorrigan]

Obviously not but your desperate attempt to paint Bjorkman as being like some idiot who doesn't know what he is talking about re Estonia doesn't work, as from what I see, his analysis and explanations are perfectly sound, conservative and not at all controversial.

OTOH I am sure he is a pesky obstreperous git who rubbed people up the wrong way. Doesn't cancel out his knowledge.

He is an idiot who doesn't know what he's talking about.

I don't care if he's odious or the nicest guy inthe world, the fact is he's a delusional crank who either does not understand basic physics or is willing to ignore basic physics when he wants to. Neither of these possibilities make him a credible expert on anything. You can't rehabilitate him. He's a lost cause. Invoking Anders Bjorkman on engineering is akin to invoking my fictitious version of Ian Wright or my fictitious Dr Smith.

 

[JayUtah]

...as from what I see, his analysis and explanations are perfectly sound, conservative and not at all controversial.

They are highly controversial, and you are not qualified to assess their objective technical strength.

OTOH I am sure he is a pesky obstreperous git who rubbed people up the wrong way. Doesn't cancel out his knowledge.

His knowledge has been determined to be faulty, and the conclusions he drew upon that erroneous understanding are patently absurd. Your frantic attempts to rewrite the criticism against him as being personal dislike or hatred are growing ever more comical.

 

[Axxman300]

Because when a boat capsizes it turns upside down very rapidly. It doesn't float about on its side for any length of time. In the JAIC scenario, because the [maximum] 4,500tonnes presumed [never proven] water on the car deck was not enough to cause the boat to capsize [even the JAIC had to admit this in their report instead of in their customary manner, ignoring it], so it had the vessel floating on its side for half an hour as the windows of the superstructure needed to be smashed by the beastly waves, and saturation to happen that way.

Everything you've written here is a lie.

Once the water on the car deck is knee-deep, it is enough - IN THOSE CONDITIONS - cause the ship to roll, which almost all ferries seem to do. The Estonia's engineer said as much in his testimony that when he saw on the cameras the water sloshing from side-to-side on the car deck, he knew he had to get off the ship immediately because, "It would sink like a rock."

And while you're hung up on the windows, you ignore the massive staircases and air vents of the interior which sea water used to floor the superstructure.

The sinking time begins when the bow visor began to fail, and take on water, not when the ship rolled. Estonia didn't sink fast at all.

 

[MarkCorrigan]

Again, you are relying on the physics ability of a man who thinks nuclear weapons don't exist. The sheer level of ignorance of basic fundemental physics that belief must entail renders him utterly incapable of being an expert.

You're relying on the engineering ability of a man who thinks that the collapse of the World Trade Center towers can be accurately modelled by dropping a bowling ball onto a stack of pizza boxes. The level of ignorance of basic engineering principles (as in, I understand why this is insane and I know virtually nothing about engineering) involved to sustain this belief is so vast that he cannot be relied upon as an expert in engineering.

You are doing EXACTLY the equivalent of saying that we should listen to the drug knowledge of a doctor who thinks that germs are not real. The situations are not only close enough to be directly analogous they map perfectly.

 

[Andy_Ross]

So why was retrieving an attaché case important but not identifying whether Andresson was on the bridge or not? And if not, then who was?

Who says it was important? As far as I can see as they were inspecting the ship they came across it and it was decided to retrieve it.

 

[Axxman300]

Oh please. We were talking about earpieces, not headphones. The earpiece fits into the helmet. So of course you can have two different sources. Suppose someone of a higher rank than your supervisor also wants to instruct you but it is confidential for some reason on a 'need to know basis' So, whilst the elite Rockwater divers were down there outsourced by the Swedish Government, they do appear to have carried out work for the police and military the same time, why not, t make sense to make full use of the time down there. If you happened to be on the bridge, you can look for the navigation system and logbook on the one hand - or in the one ear - and a little bit of recce on the other. The Rockwater diver was seen in the clip released to the public to enter the bridge. The clip in which the diver goes into Voronin/Piht's cabin and a series of them, is on Deck 5 and 6, with 7 being staff quarters and 8/9 the bridge. So, going done to the fifth deck must have been exceedingly hazardous to begin with and the doors seemed to be locked, so he had to patiently break in, with various jemmies and crowbars. None of this is mentioned in the JAIC Report. The Rockwater survey for the commission only mentions the specific area in the scope (e.g., the bridge).

The tape was handed over to the Swedish government and Rockwater had to sign an affidavat that they had destroyed any copies, after a set number of days in case of an accident claim by a diver. Ostensibly it was to 'protect the deceased' but it could equally have been classified official secrets stuff.

Are you claiming radios work under water?

 

[Vixen]

JAIC report contains all the information on the certification.
All of Chapter 3 section 3.6 Certificates and inspections is given over to it.

Sure, the JAIC looks at the bow visor and car ramp in great voluminous detail. I'll grant you that.


It never investigated anything else.


Like early stone age man who thought the shadows on the cave wall were the outside world.

 

[Vixen]

then how did it sink if it didn't flood?



So it did sink due to flooding?

How long did it take to sink? if it was an explosion and a 'breach in the hull' shouldn't it have gone down like a stone in around 35 minutes?

Water getting into the ventilation pipes is a well-known cause of ship explosions. Oceanos got flooded because of an explosion.

Earlier repairs to the waste disposal system had not been completed, which meant that a vital ventilation pipe which ran through the watertight aft bulkhead and the non-return valves were not replaced.

wiki

Likewise, Estonia was not a true The Herald of Free Enterprise accident either.

 

[Vixen]

It's ironic that if noticed and an exemption applied for it could have been certified and would still have sunk.

Which tells us that a certificate of 'seaworthiness' does not mean your ship won't have failures or can't sink.

Exactly but JAIC seem to think it is enough to state it was seaworthy. End of subject.

 

[Vixen]

How the CHP does it in fatal accidents is they check the service records for the car, and their mechanics inspect, and in some cases dismantle components.

To underline how worthless this analogy is, NOBODY has their car inspected by state officials every day, or every week, or even every month.

You are trying to defend a stupid line of reason.

I was just trying to point out that the Atlantic lock is an accessory, which was introduced to ease tension on the side locks. In reality, removing the Atlantic Lock doesn't really increase the tension by that much.

The JAIC seem to think the Atlantic lock caused the side locks to come loose the same time as it did, by one wave force.