The sinking of MS Estonia: Case Reopened Part VII

[Andy_Ross]

AIUI the early naval divers recruited to survey the scene, were doing it for a military report, so I can see no reason why they would not have described exactly what they saw. This is a survey, not a party political broadcast designed to 'reassure the public' or cover up systemic mishaps or practices.

Have you read the report? What military was it for?
What was the purpose and aim of the dive?

 

[Vixen]

Just because a storm is 'normal' doesn't mean it's any less dangerous.

Lots of ships have sunk in 'normal' storms.

Do you believe you know better than a captain who was there at the scene?

 

[Jack by the hedge]

Once the listing passes a certain point, say 50° (off the top of my head) then overturning becomes inevitable.

Says who?

To explain the Estonia, the JAIC had to hypothesize the windows on Deck 4 [iirc] must have smashed, causing ingress onto superstructure, high above the water level.

You are inviting us to infer the JAIC invented an hypothesis which is in some way unlikely. I think that smells like BS. They concluded the windows, intended to withstand winds and spray, could have failed when immersed in the pounding waves. (Not when "high above the water level" which would of course not been a way of rapidly shipping many tons of water.)

 

[Jack by the hedge]

Do you believe you know better than a captain who was there at the scene?

Do you believe you know what a straw man argument is?

 

[dorricc0]

Once the listing passes a certain point, say 50° (off the top of my head) then overturning becomes inevitable. To explain the Estonia, the JAIC had to hypothesize the windows on Deck 4 [iirc] must have smashed, causing ingress onto superstructure, high above the water level.

To be honest, if the listing is bad enough to smash windows on the superstructure, and with an open car deck already containing many tonnes of water sloshing around, and more water rushing in from the bow, and water rushing in from many other non-watertight apertures above the normal waterline, the smashing of windows is neither here nor there.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Do you believe you know better than a captain who was there at the scene?

I have been in plenty of 'normal' winter storms in the Atlantic.
Lots of ships have sunk in 'normal' storms and they had captains 'at the scene'.
I know to alter course and speed if needed.
I know it's different for every ship as every ship has different characteristics.

You know nothing of ship handling, storm procedures or weather routing of ships.

 

[Andy_Ross]

To be honest, if the listing is bad enough to smash windows on the superstructure, and with an open car deck already containing many tonnes of water sloshing around, and more water rushing in from the bow, and water rushing in from many other non-watertight apertures above the normal waterline, the smashing of windows is neither here nor there.

Water high in the superstructure would tend to increase the angle of, and rate of listing. It's a contributing factor to the speed of sinking.
But as you say, the main cause would be the water filling the hull through the much larger openings.

 

[Jack by the hedge]

To be honest, if the listing is bad enough to smash windows on the superstructure, and with an open car deck already containing many tonnes of water sloshing around, and more water rushing in from the bow, and water rushing in from many other non-watertight apertures above the normal waterline, the smashing of windows is neither here nor there.

As I remember the report (dangerous to rely on memory of course) they concluded that large windows on decks 4 and 5 likely failed as they became immersed, which fitted with their calculations of the rate water would need to be shipped for the ship to settle in the manner and in the time the surviving witnesses reported.

I also remember a curiosity - that while most people who participated in the long-running discussion have indeed read the report, one of us seemed to make it almost a point of honour only to refer to or quote from a version of the report as posted on a particular crank website, so we can't be sure they ever read the genuine or complete report.

 

[P.J. Denyer]

What do sailing race rules have to do with anything? Why would someone that invented a set of racing rules know anything about it?

What experience would he have with seabed tracks?

I'm sure someone who knows more about the subject will correct me if I am in error, but my layman's understanding of sailing races is that participants go to some lengths to avoid visiting the sea bed.

 

[Jack by the hedge]

I'm sure someone who knows more about the subject will correct me if I am in error, but my layman's understanding of sailing races is that participants go to some lengths to avoid visiting the sea bed.

Don't be modest. You clearly sound like quite an expert.

 

[P.J. Denyer]

Don't be modest. You clearly sound like quite an expert.

I grew up in a fishing village that later got a couple of marinas. You pick up some stuff by osmosis.

 

[W.D.Clinger]

First, let's remind ourselves that @Vixen has never cited any verifiable and credible source for a red-jacketed victim on the bridge. She has cited some unspecified Rockwell Rockwater report, but at least two of us have read Rockwater reports that say nothing of the sort. These quotations are a bit long (especially the first), so I'm putting them in a spoiler.

As for the real-world victims of this disaster, @Vixen does not appear to have given (within this thread) any genuine source for her claim that someone wearing a red jacket was found on the bridge. It is of course entirely possible that a red-jacketed victim was seen on the bridge, and I have not searched @Vixen's many posts in this thread's predecessors. Within this thread, her three references to the red jacket:

• name no source other than "a diver"
• cite "Rockwell Report plus video youtube (search function should call all this up)"
• cite "Sorry, yes, the Rockwater Report (I never was good at names)."

That third citation (from earlier today) corrects the second (from yesterday).

My online search for the "Rockwater Report" found this:

SUPPLEMENT No. 503
Rockwater A/S
Condition Survey of the Vessel "Estonia" for the Swedish National
Maritime Administration
Survey Report​

That report does not mention a red-jacketed victim on the bridge. Its section 2.8 reports "The bodies of 3 of the victims of the disaster were found on the Bridge." Immediately following that sentence, section 2.8 closes with this paragraph:

Section 2.3.1 ("Confidentiality") says all of Rockwater's video tapes were either "handed over to the NMA Representative" or would "be destroyed".

There might be other documents that could be described as a "Rockwater Report", but I think it's fair to say @Vixen has yet to cite an identifiable and credible source that confirms a red-jacketed victim on the bridge.

Got a link to your "source".
I can in a couple of CT sites that also claim to have the divers' descriptions of the 3 on the bridge.
But they also claim this mysterious "unofficial" third person was wearing a red/brown suit. Not a red jacket.
The YT videos are useless sources.

I can not find any description of this body in any RockWellWater reports that I can find.
Section 8.8 of the JAIC report summarises the divers' observations with no mention of jacket or suit or colour.

So you have no source for your assertion, only undocumented heresay that is not documented in any official report.
Certainly none of this is in the JAIC reports or the RockWellWater reports.

For your information, in the UK, 'psychologist' is not a protected designation. Anyone can call themself a 'psychologist'. However, I have never referred to myself as a 'psychologist'. You just don't get that some of us have values and authenticity, which includes not claiming unearnt or 'stolen' honours. I know that is a principle some cultures find hard to grasp. (Cue the bullying.)

I did not say it was my current profession. ETA: When one has honesty, integrity and authenticity as core values, it is remarkable the incredible lengths some people will go to try to drag you down.

Hey, it can happen even to those who don't have honesty, integrity, and authenticity as core values.

Nobody was mocked for identifying seabed tracks. Someone who assumed that meant tracks left by submarines was challenged on their assumption.

How does that give him experience with tracks made by submarines?

Do U-Boats have wheels (apart from one experimental and crazy mini sub)

How do I know, I was quoting credible experts. relating first hand observations, with no reason one can see to lie about what they saw?

You don't know.

No credible expert has said U-Boats have wheels. No credible expert has said a submarine left tracks on the seabed near the site of the disaster we're discussing. No credible expert has related first hand observations of any such thing.

No credible expert has lied about this. One credulous non-expert lied when she says (above) she was quoting credible experts who support her entirely imaginary tale of tracks left on the seabed by a submarine in the vicinity.

 

[MarkCorrigan]

I have no control over your thoughts or emotions.

You've been caught in a lie.

You claimed you were a psychologist then later you stated you never claimed to be one. Even without the post wherein you imply you were one you have been directly claiming to be a psychologist.

 

[MarkCorrigan]

Sea of Death ~ the Baltic 1945, Claes Göran Wetterholm, The History Pres, 2021. See p. 115 re the Wilhelm Gustloff and Captain Heinz Schön*. An excellent book worth reading.

*Re screaming for a gun to shoot his wife and kids.

Oh that book that I own that you lied about the contents of? That Sea of Death?

 

[JayUtah]

This is exactly it, it is in the public interest to know...
It is in the public interest....
In a public investigation people are entitled to have an answer as to what the heck was going on with the captain...
It is not acceptable to say, you don't need to know.

All of these assertions come with the assumed premise, "...and I know what I'm talking about." But we know you don't actually know anything about forensic engineering investigations. You're just making all this up—Vixensplaining buttressed by nothing except boasts of superior intelligence and high moral character. You're right about one thing, though. You do state your assumptions. The problem is that you state them as fact.

 

[Jack by the hedge]

I grew up in a fishing village that later got a couple of marinas.

My sympathies. My friend's mum had one. Traded it in for an Ital. Same terrible car, more garish colour.

 

[P.J. Denyer]

My sympathies. My friend's mum had one. Traded it in for an Ital. Same terrible car, more garish colour.

They were the best anyone could afford in a fishing village.

 

[JayUtah]

Why would it turn 'belly up'?

Every sinking is different.

Estonia flooded through the open bow visor, it listed and the machinery spaces flooded through deck and superstructure openings.

Why does it need to turn 'belly up'
That's something you invented. Very few ships sink 'belly up'

Indeed, a ship sinks for exactly and only one reason: it has lost buoyancy. That loss can occur for any of a number of reasons, and with the ship in any orientation. Stated better, the ship's orientation is utterly irrelevant to its buoyancy.

How a ship maintains roll stability is an entirely separate matter of physics involving the center of gravity and the center of buoyancy. There is a simple model for reckoning this in terms of a derived property called metacentric height. The righting moment in a roll is determined by the righting arm, a conceptual geometrical construct in the model. The way the ship behaves under normal circumstances is governed by the simple form of this model, which includes the concept of the angle of vanishing stability, where the direction of the righting arm reverses, the roll rate increases, and the ship capsizes.

What's important about this model is that it deals with external forces that cause roll, such as wind and waves. Consequently it fixes the center of gravity and allows only the center of buoyancy to vary. This is what is meant when the model is said to work only for an intact hull. If the vessel begins to ship water for any reason, the free surface effect preferentially directs water to the low side of the ship. This then causes the center of gravity to become a variable in the model instead of a fixed point. (The same thing can happen with shifting cargo.) When this happens, the righting arm doesn't work as intended in the intact-hull case. The simple form of the model no longer describes the physical behavior of the vessel. One of the things that can happen is that the righting moment can be zero with the ship at some arbitrary roll angle. Specifically the righting arm has a length of zero with the ship at that roll angle. There is no physical law dictating that a ship taking on water must continue to attempt to right itself, or indeed must increase its roll rate as the former angle of vanishing stability is exceeded. In effect, the computation of that angle is now dynamic owing to the independently varying centers of gravity and buoyancy.

Further, the center of buoyancy is merely the center of mass of the volume of water displaced by the vessel. In the orientations contemplated by the naval architect, this would be restricted to a fairly manageable envelope of values. A foundering ship quickly exceeds that envelope. Again, the external-force physics of ship roll stability break down quite quickly when the vessel begins to take on water.

Finally, as we have discussed at length and then witnessed in the loss of the sailing yacht Bayesian, the important angle is usually not the angle of vanishing stability, but the downflooding angle. This is the roll angle at which the first opening into the hull passes below the water surface and allows water to begin entering the hull. That's the angle at which center of gravity starts to become a variable rather than a fixed point. And it's also—separately—the time when buoyancy begins to decrease.

No two sinking vessels progress through all the possible physical states, and no two sinking vessels will progress through them in the same order or the same rate. And this part of the physics dialogue is where Vixen utterly flunked the test. She got hung up on the basic concepts of points, lines, and vectors—those things you start learning about in primary school. And she could not contemplate at all what would be needed to adjust the model to account for flooding. So no, when Vixen tries to explain how ship's sink, the premise, "...and I know what I'm talking about," was proven false long ago.

 

[Steve]

How confident can we be that "that is what is claimed"? You always leave me wondering if what you actually mean is "that's my recollection of my interpretation of what my preferred crank's website says someone else claimed".

It is what Vixen claims. In her uniquely sleazy way of writing to leave room to squirm out of it when challenged - "I did not write it in exactly those words!". (Vixen has actually never on this forum. on any topic, made an actual claim that she will stick to.)

 

[JayUtah]

Once the listing passes a certain point, say 50° (off the top of my head) then overturning becomes inevitable.

No. A list by definition is a stable state where the righting moment is zero but the ship is not level. The model you're referring to is for an intact hull that heels, not lists. Heeling is a transient condition caused by external forces such as wind and waves, and the righting moment generated by those physical principles does not behave the same way in a flooding ship.