Cont: The Sinking of MS Estonia: Case Reopened Part V

[GlennB]

No, the idea that a 25 mph wind force is the same as a wave also being 25 mph as a result thereof, is YOUR logical misunderstanding!

wtaf??

This is precisely what a bunch of people here have been telling you for a couple of days - that windows broke because of the waves, not the wind. Do you ever actually read what people are writing?

 

[Here_to_learn]

Whichever side you are on, it is an unavoidable truth that those victims of the Estonia accident are almost certainly a result of 'politics' and the subsequent cover up denying the victims' families any closure but cruelly palming them off with a cock and bull story about a 'design fault in the bow visor', .

No, that may be your view, by I for one do not agree that it's an "unavoidable truth", and I'm pretty sure that you would have a hard time finding anyone in this thread accepting that statement.

You would not even get all survivors/family members to agree with that. Some specifically say that it's the conspiracy theorists continued 'just asking questions' that denies them closure.

 

[Vixen]

In the UK the Prime Minister is delegated the power to command the armed forces by the Queen. Chief of the Defence Staff (CDS) is the professional head of the British Armed Forces and is appointed by the Prime Minister. Currently he is Admiral Sir Tony Radakin.

He can be replaced or removed by the PM.

Sure, in theory, the monarchy can be got rid of by an Act of Parliament but it is hardly going to happen, with the 'men in grey' éminence grise in place.

 

[Vixen]

But we know it's not the same. waves still exist for a while after a gale has died away, they will still do damage to a ship if it pitches in to them.
It is the act of the ship's bow plunging in to a wave as it pitches that does the damage. That's why ships slow down when they are heading in to a big sea.

Wasn't it you who made a one-on-one comparison by saying you wouldn't mind a gale force wind at your window but would object to water thrown at it at a similar speed?

That is surely to misunderstand who and what is driving the water forward in the first place. If nobody or nothing is chucking water at your window, then where would it get its window breaking properties from? I am afraid a wind speed at 100mph in the direction of your window can certainly break it as efficiently as your neighbour throwing stones at it. However, the wind blowing a roof slate into your window and breaking it, does not mean that the slate is travelling at the same speed as the wind - or has the same force - and of course it has a totally different mass and density than air, that hardly needs to be said.

Yes, ships pitch into the waves. However, if the helmsman makes a righting move away from those waves, the consequent ingress of water over the decks is now in abeyance. The Estonia was travelling forwards westerly towards Stockholm, according to the JAIC, but could just as easily still be going more northwesterly towards the gentler route via the archipelago, when it encountered trouble. Once it turned westward and then sharply back south, later to turn eastwards and cross back over the path it had come, according to the JAIC Kalmar chart, then the ingress of water and pitching will follow a completely different pattern. Attached the Speigel version timing and the JAIC one.

 

[Vixen]

wtaf??

This is precisely what a bunch of people here have been telling you for a couple of days - that windows broke because of the waves, not the wind. Do you ever actually read what people are writing?

And WHAT force drove the waves to smash the windows in the first place?

 

[GlennB]

And WHAT force drove the waves to smash the windows in the first place?

The wind, obviously. The discussion grew from your stubborn refusal to accept that waves might have smashed higher windows when the ship had heeled over because now the windows would be in reach of the waves. You kept talking about the wind, people kept telling you that the force of water - even moving a lot slower than the wind that was driving the waves - could break windows that were only designed to resist the force of wind and spray.

You're just not registering a damn thing that people say, even when you appear to have accepted their point. You keep returning to the comfort of some irrelevant triviality where what you say is not factually wrong.

 

[MarkCorrigan]

Vixen, do you think that a gust of wind going at 25 mph would impart the same amount of force as a wave of water going at the same speed?

 

[JayUtah]

There are plenty of research papers on the subject.

No. "Research papers" do not embody or present industry standards.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Sure, in theory, the monarchy can be got rid of by an Act of Parliament but it is hardly going to happen, with the 'men in grey' éminence grise in place.

Who mentioned getting rid of the monarchy?
Your claim was that the PM has no say i n who the generals are
In the UK at least it is the PM that appoints the Chief Of Staff that in turn appoints the service commanders. This power is delegated by the Monarch to the PM.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Wasn't it you who made a one-on-one comparison by saying you wouldn't mind a gale force wind at your window but would object to water thrown at it at a similar speed?

That is surely to misunderstand who and what is driving the water forward in the first place. If nobody or nothing is chucking water at your window, then where would it get its window breaking properties from? I am afraid a wind speed at 100mph in the direction of your window can certainly break it as efficiently as your neighbour throwing stones at it. However, the wind blowing a roof slate into your window and breaking it, does not mean that the slate is travelling at the same speed as the wind - or has the same force - and of course it has a totally different mass and density than air, that hardly needs to be said.

Yes, ships pitch into the waves. However, if the helmsman makes a righting move away from those waves, the consequent ingress of water over the decks is now in abeyance. The Estonia was travelling forwards westerly towards Stockholm, according to the JAIC, but could just as easily still be going more northwesterly towards the gentler route via the archipelago, when it encountered trouble. Once it turned westward and then sharply back south, later to turn eastwards and cross back over the path it had come, according to the JAIC Kalmar chart, then the ingress of water and pitching will follow a completely different pattern. Attached the Speigel version timing and the JAIC one.

It turned off the wind and broached sideways when power was lost. When a ship loses power it will always turn beam on to the wind and waves and drift downwind.

It lost power because it was driven too hard in to the waves .

 

[Myriad]

The problem is, the JAIC report declares that on the day of departure, the Estonia was seaworthy and that there were no outstanding issues.

The blame is placed on 'a design fault of the bow visor'.

Of course people should know you should drive safely. In the icy conditions we have here - frozen rain on top of snow and a lack of grit/sand due to huge demand this year - it is common sense to avoid skidding by not going over 45 mph as sliding into the wrong lane or a wall is correlated with high speeds. A car found itself skidding in front of an oncoming van and both were written off. Police said it was the fault of the person who finds themselves in the wrong lane for whatever reason. The idea that the senior crew of the Estonia had no idea how to sail in a storm is questionable because it did turn to port. One wonders whether the Captain had been incapacitated or whether there was sabotage, such as an explosive device loosening the ramp, as there was very little time to save the situation. Zero evacuation, no time to launch the life boats. Series of bangs heard at Swedish midnight midway through its journey and during a change of watch on the bridge. No Mayday from the captain. Perhaps there was nothing the crew could had done that would have stopped the disaster.

When it comes to sequences of bad decisions leading to disaster, "nothing could be done" is always the end of the story, not the beginning. When a mountaineer is trapped on a high Himalayan summit, too cold to move and out of oxygen, in bad weather with no rescue possible, one doesn't ask why nothing could be done at that point. The question is how that situation came about to begin with, and what could and should have been done earlier, when there were still options, before the scenario became lethal.

The decision (by, in this case, governments) to permit vessels configured for coastal waters to be used as open-water ferries; the poor maintenance of the vessel; the decision by the command crew to sail that vessel into a storm with an unbalanced load that could not be corrected to a proper trim; the decision to sail a direct course at full speed; the decision to pay minimal heed to warning signs of trouble -- those are the irresponsible decisions that doomed the ship and most of the passengers and crew. Even if there was sabotage, for which there is no evidence whatsoever, it was entirely unnecessary under the circumstances. Sabotage didn't cause the command crew to steer a weak unbalanced leaky vessel directly into storm waves at full speed without adequate watch below decks. Any sabotage that could have occurred after those negligent decisions led to inevitable crisis was irrelevant, like sending an assassin to murder the alpinist who's already trapped and freezing on a high summit due to pressing his luck much too far. (And just as impractical to carry out, as well.)

When I started following this thread, I was quite content to assume that the sinking was a tragic accident caused by completely unexpected equipment failure. "A design fault" unknown to everyone concerned. But thanks in part to your tireless efforts to throw doubt and blame around in all directions, it's become clear how the vessel was operated with depraved indifference making a disaster inevitable sooner or later. There were saboteurs on the bridge, sure enough. They were running the ship.

 

[JayUtah]

The problem is, the JAIC report declares that on the day of departure, the Estonia was seaworthy and that there were no outstanding issues.

Yes. Every time you raise this point, it's pointed out to that this statement is formulaic in these kinds of reports. It is not a declaration that the ship is free from defects and is being operated in a safe manner. I went into some detail about how passenger-worthiness certificates, inspections, mitigations, and declarations work in transportation. You apparently weren't interested in what the actual facts are.

The blame is placed on 'a design fault of the bow visor'.

No, the blame is apportioned sensibly among several contributing factors, among which is the design of the bow visor. Most transportation accidents have a number of contributing factors, each of which is often considered relatively manageable by itself.

You insist on oversimplifying the official report so that it seems inadequate. You've started with the presumption that the JAIC report is a whitewash, and you're scrambling to find some other narrative. All those you've proposed are ridiculous.

 

[JayUtah]

Yes, ships pitch into the waves. However, if the helmsman makes a righting move away from those waves...

Helm operators do not make "righting moves." Throwing around nautical-sounding language does not convince us you know what you're talking about.

 

[jimbob]

One of these statements is not like the other.

For example here is the Ventusky app for a location in the North Sea, chosen pretty much at random

https://www.ventusky.com/?p=53.75;4.68;6&l=wave

Showing the significant wave height, and showing the wind waves and swell waves directions.

You can clearly see that these two types of wave can be travelling in different directions at the same time

 

[Vixen]

The wind, obviously. The discussion grew from your stubborn refusal to accept that waves might have smashed higher windows when the ship had heeled over because now the windows would be in reach of the waves. You kept talking about the wind, people kept telling you that the force of water - even moving a lot slower than the wind that was driving the waves - could break windows that were only designed to resist the force of wind and spray.

You're just not registering a damn thing that people say, even when you appear to have accepted their point. You keep returning to the comfort of some irrelevant triviality where what you say is not factually wrong.

The point being made is that waves do not just come from anywhere and from any direction. They follow rules of gravity, motion, velocity and force. For waves to smash the Deck 4 and 5 windows, the JAIC had to claim the waves would have jumped up at a weird angle (bearing in mind the list is 50° to 70° for twenty minutes before sinking when it should have capsized within seconds at that angle [assuming no breach in the hull]) and in disconnecting the bow visor, they somehow had the power to change direction to back and up, having just bashed the nose forward and aft. From knowing the windspeed that night we are able to estimate wave height as being between 4m - 6m.

According to the final disaster report, the weather was rough, with a wind of 15 to 20 m/s (29 to 39 kn; 34 to 45 mph), force 7–8 on the Beaufort scale and a significant wave height of 4 to 6 m (13 to 20 ft)[JAIC 2]

From the windspeed, we can ascertain what the wave height is and from that, depending in the wind direction and speed of the vessel, the level of impact.

According to modelled satellite data, gusts were in the excess of 85–100 km/h (24–28 m/s) at 01:00 that night over the Baltic Sea, although the ship had not yet reached the areas with the heaviest gusts before its sinking

wiki


Just that one little measure tells you a whole story. What we are missing is information as to the level of resistance of the glass used as windows or the inner dividers on those decks. It is my understanding that these passenger ferries used glass designed to withstand a wind speed factor of 41 m/s, which obviously takes into account the likely power of a wave emanating from such a wind speed.

 

[JayUtah]

The point being made is that waves do not just come from anywhere and from any direction.

At the local scope, a wave can crash in any direction.

They follow rules of gravity, motion, velocity and force.

They follow the rules of fluid dynamics, which can exhibit quite complex behavior.

Just that one little measure tells you a whole story.

Never.

It is my understanding that these passenger ferries used glass designed to withstand a wind speed factor of 41 m/s, which obviously takes into account the likely power of a wave emanating from such a wind speed.

Your understanding is incorrect. The calculation of a structure to withstand a wind load does not inform, nor is informed by, any calculation of wave impact. You're manufacturing a design requirement out of thin air.

 

[Vixen]

Vixen, do you think that a gust of wind going at 25 mph would impart the same amount of force as a wave of water going at the same speed?

Not a like-for-like situation.


You need to know how deep/shallow that water is and what it is acting on that wave to make it move. So, you could have a wind speed of 25 mph and also a wave at 25mph if you have some guy driving a speedboat through the water to cause a wave of that exact velocity. But what would be the point of such an exercise?

 

[Vixen]

It turned off the wind and broached sideways when power was lost. When a ship loses power it will always turn beam on to the wind and waves and drift downwind.

It lost power because it was driven too hard in to the waves .

So tell me, what came first, the list at >40° or the bow visor disconnecting?


It lost power because the four engines cut out. And that would have been because of the list.

So, which came first, the violent list, or the bow visor dropping?

 

[GlennB]

**irrelevance snipped**

Just that one little measure tells you a whole story. What we are missing is information as to the level of resistance of the glass used as windows or the inner dividers on those decks. It is my understanding that these passenger ferries used glass designed to withstand a wind speed factor of 41 m/s, which obviously takes into account the likely power of a wave emanating from such a wind speed.

The usual utterly nonsensical word-salad.

The whole point is that waves were not expected to hit the windows in question at all. The force of such waves - once they got at the windows - massively exceeded the force of the wind that was driving them.

That wind? Windows are ok.
Those waves? Windows are not ok.

 

[Vixen]

When it comes to sequences of bad decisions leading to disaster, "nothing could be done" is always the end of the story, not the beginning. When a mountaineer is trapped on a high Himalayan summit, too cold to move and out of oxygen, in bad weather with no rescue possible, one doesn't ask why nothing could be done at that point. The question is how that situation came about to begin with, and what could and should have been done earlier, when there were still options, before the scenario became lethal.

The decision (by, in this case, governments) to permit vessels configured for coastal waters to be used as open-water ferries; the poor maintenance of the vessel; the decision by the command crew to sail that vessel into a storm with an unbalanced load that could not be corrected to a proper trim; the decision to sail a direct course at full speed; the decision to pay minimal heed to warning signs of trouble -- those are the irresponsible decisions that doomed the ship and most of the passengers and crew. Even if there was sabotage, for which there is no evidence whatsoever, it was entirely unnecessary under the circumstances. Sabotage didn't cause the command crew to steer a weak unbalanced leaky vessel directly into storm waves at full speed without adequate watch below decks. Any sabotage that could have occurred after those negligent decisions led to inevitable crisis was irrelevant, like sending an assassin to murder the alpinist who's already trapped and freezing on a high summit due to pressing his luck much too far. (And just as impractical to carry out, as well.)

When I started following this thread, I was quite content to assume that the sinking was a tragic accident caused by completely unexpected equipment failure. "A design fault" unknown to everyone concerned. But thanks in part to your tireless efforts to throw doubt and blame around in all directions, it's become clear how the vessel was operated with depraved indifference making a disaster inevitable sooner or later. There were saboteurs on the bridge, sure enough. They were running the ship.

Welcome to my world. We all agree the vessel was in an unsatisfactory state.

However, the JAIC says on the day of departure it was seaworthy and there were no issues.

However, it doesn't follow that because the bow visor had metal fatigue and corrosion, that ipso facto that must be the reason for the accident. There was zero time to even begin to evacuate the passengers, which tells you it was not a gradual scenario of one bit falling off after another, as with an old banger, but something cataclysmic and sudden.