MS Estonia

MS Estonia
Career
Name:	1980–1990: MS Viking Sally 1990–1991: MS Silja Star 1991–1993: MS Wasa King 1993–1994: MS Estonia
Owner:	1980–1988: Rederi Ab Sally 1988–1992: Effoa 1992–1993: Effdo 3 Oy 1993–1994: Estline Marine Co Ltd
Operator:	1980–1987: Rederi Ab Sally (Viking Line traffic) 1987–1990: Rederi AB Slite (Viking Line traffic) 1990–1991: Silja Line 1991–1993: Wasa Line 1993–1994: EstLine
Port of registry:	1980–1991: Mariehamn, Finland 1991–1993: Vaasa, Finland 1993–1994: Tallinn, Estonia
Ordered:	1979-09-11
Builder:	Meyer Werft, Papenburg, West Germany
Yard number:	590
Laid down:	18 October 1979
Launched:	26 April 1980
Acquired:	29 June 1980
In service:	5 July 1980
Identification:	IMO number: 7921033
Fate:	Sunk 28 September 1994 (59°23′N 21°42′E)
General characteristics
Type:	cruiseferry
Tonnage:	15,566 gross register tons (GRT) 2,800 metric tons deadweight (DWT)
Length:	155.43 m (509 ft 11 in) 1984 onwards 157.02 m (515.16 ft)
Beam:	24.21 m (79 ft 5 in)
Draught:	5.55 metres (18 ft 3 in)
Decks:	9
Ice class:	1 A
Installed power:	4 × MAN 8L 40 /45 diesels combined 17,652 kW (23,671 hp)
Speed:	21 knots (38.89 km/h; 24.17 mph)
Capacity:	2000 passengers 1190 passenger berths 460 cars

MS Estonia, previously MS Viking Sally (1980–1990), MS Silja Star (–1991), and MS Wasa King (–1993), was a cruiseferry built in 1980 at the German shipyard Meyer Werft in Papenburg. The ship's sinking in the Baltic Sea on 28 September 1994, claimed 852 lives and was one of the deadliest maritime disasters of the late 20th century.

Construction

The ship was originally ordered from Meyer Werft by a Norwegian shipping company led by Parley Augustsen with intended traffic between Norway and Germany. At the last moment, the company withdrew their order and the contract went to Rederi Ab Sally, one of the partners in the Viking Line consortium (SF Line, another partner in Viking Line, had also been interested in the ship). Originally the ship was conceived as a sister ship to MS Diana II, built in 1979 by the same shipyard for Rederi AB Slite, the third partner in Viking Line. However, when Sally took over the construction contract, the ship was lengthened from the original length of approximately 137 meters to approx. 155 meters and the superstructure of the ship was largely redesigned. Meyer Werft had constructed a large number of ships for various Viking Line partner companies during the 1970s. Worth noting is the new ship's bow construction, which consisted of an upwards-opening visor and a car ramp that was placed inside the visor when it was closed. An identical bow construction had also been used in MS Diana II.

Service history

Viking Line

On 29 June 1980 Viking Sally was delivered to Rederi Ab Sally, Finland and was put into service on the route between Turku, Mariehamn and Stockholm (during summer 1982 on the Naantali—Mariehamn—Kapellskär route). She was the largest ship to serve on that route at the time. Like all ships, Viking Sally suffered some mishaps during her Viking Line service, being grounded in the Åland Archipelago in May 1984 and suffering some propeller problems in April of the following year. In 1985 she was also rebuilt with a "duck tail". In 1986, Reijo Hammar, an infamous Finnish criminal, strangled and stabbed a businessman on the ship.

Rederi Ab Sally had been experiencing financial difficulties for most of the 1980s. In late 1987, Effoa and Johnson Line, the owners of Viking Line's main rivals Silja Line, bought Sally. As a result of this, SF Line and Rederi AB Slite forced Sally to withdraw from Viking Line. Viking Sally was chartered to Rederi AB Slite to continue on her current traffic for the next three years.

EffJohn

When her charter ended in April 1990, Viking Sally had an unusual change of service. She was painted in Silja Line's colours, renamed Silja Star and placed on the same route that she had plied for Viking Line: Turku—Mariehamn—Stockholm. The reason for this was that Silja's new ship for Helsinki—Stockholm service was built behind schedule and one of the Turku—Stockholm ships, MS Wellamo, was transferred to that route until the new ship was complete in November 1990. Also in 1990 Effoa, Johnson Line and Rederi Ab Sally merged into EffJohn.

The following spring Silja Star began her service with Wasa Line, another company owned by EffJohn. Her name was changed to Wasa King and she served on routes connecting Vaasa, Finland to Umeå and Sundsvall in Sweden. It has been reported that the Wasa King was widely considered to be the best behaving ship in rough weather to have sailed from Vaasa.^{[citation needed]}

Model of the Estonia in Tallinn's Maritime Museum

Estline

In January 1993, at the same time when EffJohn decided to merge Wasa Line's operations into Silja Line, Wasa King was sold to Nordström & Thulin for use on EstLine's Tallinn—Stockholm traffic under the name Estonia. The actual ownership of the ship was rather complex, in order for Nordstöm & Thulin to get a loan to buy the ship. Although Nordström & Thulin were the company who bought the ship, her registered owners were Estline Marine Co Ltd, Nicosia, Cyprus, who chartered the ship to E.Liini A/S, Tallinn, Estonia (daughter company of Nordström & Thulin and ESCO) who in turn chartered the ship to EstLine Ab. As a result the ship was actually registered in both Cyprus and Estonia.

As the largest Estonian-owned ship of the time, the Estonia symbolized the independence that Estonia gained after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Sinking

One of Estonia's inflatable life rafts, filled with water.

The Estonia disaster occurred on Wednesday, 28 September 1994, between about 00:55 to 01:50 (UTC+2) as the ship was crossing the Baltic Sea, en route from Tallinn, Estonia, to Stockholm. The Estonia was on a scheduled crossing with departure at 19:00 in the evening on September 27. It had been expected in Stockholm the next morning at about 09:30. She was carrying 989 passengers and crew. Most of the passengers were Scandinavian while most of the crew members were Estonian. Avo Piht, a sea captain on the vessel as a passenger, was first said to have survived but his name was later struck from the list of survivors.

According to the final disaster report the weather was rough, with a wind of 15 to 20 m/s (29–39 knots/33–45 mph), force 7–8 on the Beaufort scale and a significant wave height of 3 to 4 metres (10–13 ft) compared with the highest measured significant wave height in the Baltic Sea of 7.7 metres (25.3 ft). Esa Mäkelä, the captain of MS Silja Europa who was appointed on scene commander for the subsequent rescue effort, described the weather as "normally bad", or like a typical autumn storm in the Baltic Sea. All scheduled passenger ferries were at sea.

The official report says that while the exact speed at the time of the accident is not known, Estonia had very regular voyage times, averaging 16–17 knots, perhaps implying she did not slow down for adverse conditions. The chief mate of the Viking Line cruiseferry MS Mariella tracked Estonia's speed by radar at approximately 14.2 knots before the first signs of distress, while the Silja Europa's officers estimated her speed at 14–15 knots at midnight.

The first sign of trouble onboard the Estonia was a strange sound of metal against metal heard around 01:00, when the ship was on the outskirts of the Turku archipelago, but an inspection of the bow visor showed no obvious damage. At about 01:15, the visor separated and the ship took on a heavy starboard list. At about 01:20 a weak female voice called "Häire, häire, laeval on häire", the Estonian words for "Alarm, alarm, there is alarm on the ship", over the public address system. Just a moment later an internal alarm for the crew was transmitted over the public address system. Soon after this the general lifeboat alarm was given. Soon the vessel lurched some 30 to 40 degrees to starboard, making it practically impossible to move safely inside the ship. Doors and hallways became deadly pits. Those who were going to survive were already on deck by then. A Mayday was communicated by the ship's crew at 01:22, but did not follow international formats. M/S Estonia directed a call to M/S Silja Europa and only after making contact with her the radio operator uttered the word "Mayday". In English, the radio operator on Silja Europa replied: "Estonia, are you calling mayday?" After that, another voice took over on Estonia and the conversation shifted to Finnish. The Estonia crew member was able to provide some details about their situation but due to loss of power, he could not give their position. This delayed rescue operations somewhat. The ship disappeared from the radar screens of other ships at around 01:50. Mariella arrived at the scene of the accident at 02:12; the first rescue helicopter arrived at 03:05.

Out of a total of 989 passengers and crew on board 138 were rescued alive but one died later in the hospital. The accident claimed 852 lives (501 Swedes, 285 Estonians, 17 Latvians, 10 Finns and 44 people of other nationalities: 1 from Belarus, 1 from Canada, 1 from France, 1 from the Netherlands, 1 from Nigeria, 1 from Ukraine, 1 from United Kingdom, 2 from Morocco, 3 from Lithuania, 5 from Denmark, 6 from Norway, 10 from Germany, 11 from Russia), by drowning and hypothermia, (the water temperature was 10°C–11 °C/50–52 °F). One prominent victim of the sinking was the popular Estonian singer Urmas Alender. 93 bodies were recovered within 33 days of the accident. Victim number 94 was found 18 months later. By the time the rescue helicopters began to arrive, around a third of the people who escaped from the Estonia had died of hypothermia. The survivors of the shipwreck were mostly young, of strong physical composition, and male. Seven people over 55 years of age survived. There were no survivors under age 12. About 750 people were inside the ship when it sank.

The official report blamed the accident on the failure of locks on the bow visor that broke under the strain of the waves. When the visor broke off the ship, it damaged the ramp that covered the opening to the car deck behind the visor. This allowed water into the car deck, which destabilized the ship and began a catastrophic chain of events. (Flooding on the car deck capsized the Herald of Free Enterprise, where the bow doors were left open, and the Princess Victoria, which sank in the same storm which caused the North Sea Flood of 1953. Roll-on/roll-off ferries are particularly vulnerable to capsizing due to the free surface effect if the car deck is even slightly flooded.)

The location of the hull is at 59°23′N 21°42′E, about 22 nautical miles (41 km) on bearing 157° from Utö island, Finland. She lies in between 74 and 85 metres (243–279 ft) of water.

The rescue effort

MS Estonia memorial in Tallinn

The casualties "had an immense impact on the world concept of ferry safety" and led to changes in safety regulations and liferaft design much as the Titanic disaster did in 1912. Search and Rescue followed arrangements set up under the 1979 International Convention on Maritime Search and Rescue (the SAR Convention) and the nearest Maritime Rescue Co-ordination Centre MRCC Turku coordinated the effort in accordance with Finland's plans. The Baltic is one of the World's busiest shipping areas with 2000 vessels at sea at any time and these plans assumed the ship's own boats and nearby ferries would provide immediate help and helicopters could be airborne after an hour. This scheme had worked for the relatively small number of accidents involving sinkings (3 in 2006), particularly as most ships have few people on board.

According to the official report, Estonia carried 63 inflatable rafts and 10 lifeboats. 142 of her 188 crew had undergone an IMO-approved safety training course and were proficient with survival craft whilst the vessel herself had recently taken part in a fire training exercise. The first distress call was answered by the Mariella, the closest of 5 nearby ferries but Estonia's position was only established 21 minutes before it sank. MRCC Turku failed to acknowledge the Mayday immediately and Mariella's report was relayed by Helsinki Radio as the less urgent pan-pan message. A full scale emergency was only declared at 02:30. Mariella winched open liferafts into the sea onto which 13 people on Estonia's rafts successfully transferred. She also reported rafts sighted to helicopters and OH-HVG brought 11 survivors to her. Isabella saved 16 survivors with her rescue slide.

The Finnish helicopters Super Puma OH-HVG and Agusta Bell 412 OH-HVD landed on the passenger ferries, but Swedish helicopters took the rescued survivors to land-based locations as landing on heaving and rolling ferries was too dangerous. The pilot of OH-HVG stated that landing on the ferries was the most difficult part of the whole rescue operation, however this single helicopter rescued 44 people, more than all the ferries.

Ships rescued 34 survivors and helicopters 104 survivors, one of whom died in a hospital. The ferries played a much smaller part than the planners had intended because it was too dangerous to launch their man-over-board (MOB) boats or lifeboats. Despite their success, the 2006 accident of Finnbirch shows just how difficult helicopter rescue of even fit and experienced seamen remains.

The commission estimate up to 310 passengers reached the outer decks and 160 climbed into the liferafts or lifeboats essential for survival. Most of 757 missing persons are believed to be inside the ship. “The longer a ship is able to stay afloat in the event of an accident the more successful evacuation and rescue operations will be”. The report was critical of the delays in sounding the alarm, the passivity of the crew and the lack of guidance from the bridge. In 1999, special training requirements in crowd and crisis management and human behaviour were extended to crew on all passenger ships as well as amendments to watch keeping standards. Estonia's distress beacons or EPIRBs required manual activation which didn't happen. Had they activated automatically, it would have been immediately obvious that the ship had sunk and the location would have been clear. All EPIRBs were subsequently required to deploy automatically and the accident was "instrumental in the move to legislate Voyage Data Recorders" New IMO SOLAS liferaft regulations for rescue from listing ships in rough water were introduced though launching such craft, even in training exercises, remains dangerous for the crew. However "If you are out to sea, the best lifeboat is the ship itself." New designs, the “citadel concept” once again influenced by Estonia aim to ensure damaged ships have sufficient buoyancy to remain afloat though cost will determine if any are built. SOLAS 90 which comes into effect in 2010 specifies existing passenger ships stability requirements and those in North West Europe must also be able to survive 50 cm of water on the car deck.

Causes of the disaster

Official investigation and report

The wreck was examined and videotaped by remotely operated underwater vehicles and by divers from a Norwegian company, Rockwater A/S, contracted for the investigation work. The official report indicated that the locks on the bow door had failed and the door had separated from the rest of the vessel, pulling ajar the ramp behind it. The bow visor and ramp had been torn off at points that would not trigger an "open" or "unlatched" warning on the bridge, as is the case in normal operation or failure of the latches. The bridge was also situated too far back on the ferry for the visor to be seen from there. While there was video monitoring of the inner ramp, the monitor on the bridge was not visible from the conning station. Recommendations for modifications to be applied to similar ships included separation of the condition sensors from the latch and hinge mechanisms.

Conspiracy theories

There are a few conspiracy theories, involving secret transportation of military equipment, that try to explain the disaster.

In the autumn of 2004, a former Swedish customs officer cleared his conscience on the Swedish television program Uppdrag granskning and admitted that MS Estonia had been used to transport military equipment in September 1994. The Swedish and Estonian governments subsequently launched separate investigations, headed by Court of Appeal President Johan Hirschfeldt and Republic Prosecutor Margus Kurm, respectively. Both investigations confirmed that military equipment was aboard the ship on 14 and 20 September 1994, though it stayed unclear if any such equipment was aboard the ship at the night of the disaster.

In 1999, the Joint Accident Investigation Commission responded to rumours in the media of bombs having caused the accident. In the original report, they had already ruled out traces of explosion in the visor, but after analysis of the videos where suspected bomb-like objects had been seen, an explosion as a possible cause or contributing factor in the accident was totally closed out. In 2000, American adventurer Gregg Bemis and his crew dived to the wreck and filmed the damages. They also recovered pieces of metal, which were given to various laboratories for analysis. Stephen Davis, writing in the New Statesman in May 2005 claimed that laboratory tests had confirmed evidence of explosion in the metal. Davis further claimed the ship was carrying a secret cargo of military equipment smuggled from the Russians by the British MI6 on behalf of the CIA, as part of ongoing efforts to monitor the development of Russia's weapons, and that this would explain Britain's signing of the Estonia Agreement. The Finnish members of the Joint Accident Investigation Commission again rejected the possibility of explosion, claiming that the traces found in the metal were caused by the heavy blows of the visor coming off, citing inconclusive results from another laboratory.

The German journalist Jutta Rabe also carried out her own investigations, resulting in a book. The book was turned into the fictional 2003 motion picture Baltic Storm, which portrays the Russian secret service as being responsible for the sinking, and the Swedish government's attempts to cover up the causes for the disaster. Rabe also claimed that she was scheduled to have an interview with Odd Engström, a former member of the Parliament of Sweden, about the real background of the disaster a day before he died.

Protection of the wreck

MS Estonia memorial in Stockholm

In the aftermath of the disaster, many relatives of the deceased demanded that their loved ones should be raised from international waters and given a land burial. Demands were also made that the entire ship should be raised so that the cause of the disaster could be discovered by detailed inspection.

Citing the practical difficulties and the moral implications of raising decaying bodies from the sea floor (the majority of the bodies were never recovered), but also fearing the financial burden for the costs of lifting the entire hull to the surface and the salvage operation the Swedish government suggested burying the whole ship in situ with a shell of concrete.

In the end, the Estonia Agreement 1995, a treaty between Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Denmark, Russia and the United Kingdom, declared sanctity over the site, prohibiting its citizens from even approaching the wreck. The treaty is, however, only binding for citizens of the countries that are signatories. The Swedish Navy has, at least twice, discovered illegal diving operations at the wreck. The wreck is monitored by radar by the Finnish Navy.

On 8 May 2006 the organizations of Estonian and Swedish relatives requested suspension of the diving ban by sending a letter to the governments who ratified the treaty: Estonia, Finland, Sweden, Latvia, Denmark, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, and the United Kingdom. The joint letter entreats all who read it to use their influence to amend, modify, repeal, revoke, or suspend all practical or administrative measures prohibiting inspection of the wreck in order to secure new evidence. The letter also calls for an independent group of experts, working in a transparent manner, to conduct a new investigation of the sinking of MS Estonia.

Decks and facilities

As Viking Sally

9	Bridge, sundeck
8	Sundeck
7	Crew cabins & facilities, sundeck
6	Restaurant deck – Buffet dining room, a la carte restaurant, bar, outside and inside cabins
5	Entrance & cafeteria deck – Tax-free shops, cafeteria, snack bar, discotheque, air seats, children's playroom, outside and inside cabins
4	Conference deck – Conference rooms, nightclub, cinema, inside and outside cabins
3	Car platform
2	Car deck
1	Inside cabins, engine room
0	Sauna, swimming pool, conference rooms

See also

• Canticum Calamitatis Maritimae, a choral work by Jaakko Mäntyjärvi
• Estonia, a song by Marillion
• Vedenalainen maailma, a song by Laura Sippola
• List of RORO vessel accidents
• List of accidents and disasters by death toll
• List of wars and disasters by death toll
• List of shipwrecks in 1994

References

• Final report on the MV ESTONIA disaster of 28 September 1994, Helsinki: Joint Accident Investigation Commission, 1997, http://www.onnettomuustutkinta.fi/estonia/ 

Further reading

• Björkman, Anders (2009). Disaster Investigation
• Bollyn, Christopher (5 September 2002), "New Book Says Russians Sank Baltic Ferry to Prevent Technology from Reaching West". The Truth Seeker, American Free Press.
• The German 'Group of Experts' (2006). Investigation report on the capsizing on 28 September 1994 in the Baltic Sea of the Ro-Ro Passenger Vessel MV Estonia
• Hengst, Frank. Nine people disappeared without trace after being rescued. What happened?
• Johnson, Kent L. & Smith, Kenneth M.Jr. (2009, June) "Failure Analysis of the Estonia." Advanced Materials & Processes 167(6): 29-33. [2]
• The Joint Accident Investigation Commission, Animated video (4 min) of the damage to visor and ramp.
• Rabe, Jutta (2002), "Die Estonia. Tragödie eines Schiffsuntergangs" (The Estonia. Tragedy of a ship setting), Delius Klasing Verlag GmbH
• Rabe, Jutta (2004). The Case Estonia – A journalist searching for the truth. Video report about the investigation of the sinking of the Estonia.
• Langewiesche, William (2005). The Outlaw Sea: A World of Freedom, Chaos, and Crime. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. ISBN 0865477221. 
• Limburg, Peter R. (2005), "Deep-Sea Detectives: Maritime Mysteries and Forensic Science". New York: ASJA Press. ISBN 978-0-595-37604-9.
• Wilson, Drew (2006), "The Hole: Another look at the sinking of the Estonia Ferry on September 28th 1994". Liskeard: Exposure. ISBN 978-1-84685-132-2.
• Ångström, Lars. Report to the Chancellor of Justice in Sweden, 12 September 2006
• "1994: Hundreds feared dead in ferry disaster". BBC News. 1994-09-28. http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/september/28/newsid_2542000/2542093.stm. Retrieved 2008-08-05. 
• Chronological narrative of the sinking by City Paper at the Wayback Machine (archived September 27, 2007).
• Passenger vessel Evacuation descriptions, p29. Det Norske Veritas.
• Safety at Sea Ltd (UK). A collection of scientific papers on the sinking presented in maritime experts' meetings.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to:

[[Commons: Category:M/S Estonia

| M/S Estonia

]]

• Estoniasamlingen – In Swedish. Governmental resource of material relevant to the catastrophe.
• The Mayday call from Estonia (audio)
• Estonia Litigation Association – Organization of Relatives and Victims Pressing for Truth through Litigation
• Ferry-Site.dk historic images of Viking Sally and Silja Star
• [3] Recording of Jaakko Mäntyjärvi composition: Canticum Calamitatis Maritimae about the disaster
• Photos of the memorial for the sunken "Estonia" at sites-of-memory.de