The Ship Sinking MS Estonia (Disaster Documentary)

the sinking of the ms estonia swallowed by the cold and merciless baltic sea enclosed by central and northern european countries is one of the most extraordinary and beautiful seas however its beauty tends to be treacherous as the harsh climate in the baltic sea makes it pretty inhospitable for centuries the baltic sea has been infamous among seafarers with a number of shipwrecks lying on the bottom of the sea to prove it in 1994 the stormy waters of the baltic took away the lives of hundreds of victims and one of the greatest peacetime sinkings in the history of europe welcome to dark history where we unravel the most disastrous events in history if you want to support the channel consider subscribing and like this video the disaster that shook the continent and the entire world happened on september 28 1994 the ship involved was ms estonia a huge german-built cruise ferry owned by the swedish estonian s-line marine shipping company on that day the ferry carried 989 people of which 803 were passengers traveling from tallinn estonia to stockholder sweden the ferry departed from talon the day before on september 27th at 1915. weather stations forecasted rough weather on the open sea nothing unusual for this part of the year though despite the slight list to starboard the captain and his crew had things under control despite the fact they were sailing through waves of up to 20 feet high six hours after ms estonia left the port at o121 its radio operator began sending mayday signals half an hour later the ship disappeared from radar screens ms estonia was anything but a small ship and seemed capable of withstanding the bad weather at sea it was built in 1980 in the meyer wharfed shipyard in pampenburg west germany the ship was an 11 deck vessel 515.16 feet in length and with a tonnage of 15 598 gross tons it was indeed a huge vessel designed to accommodate 2000 passengers and 460 cars ms estonia was a roro type of vessel short for roll-on roll-off meaning that the vehicles are driven on and off the ship on their own wheels via built-in ramp before the sinking ms estonia sailed for 14 years under flags of four different operators then in january 1993 it was purchased by the s line and became the largest estonian vessel and a symbol of the country's recently regained independence for more than a year and a half ms estonia sailed from talon to stockholm it was quite a busy line because estonia was a popular destination for swedish tourists on september 27 1994 the ship was boarded by 803 passengers around half the ferry's capacity there were also 186 crew members taking the number of people on board to 989. when ms estonia left the port at talon the weather was nice and calm however once it sailed away from coastal waters weather conditions began to change what ms estonia encountered could be called rough weather by all means the wind speed was between 15 and 20 meters per second on the beaufort windforce scale such conditions are categorized as moderate gale but at the same time call for a warning gale pennant the waves reached a height of up to 20 feet just five feet short of the highest measured wave height on the baltic sea however it seemed the weather conditions were still within the usual bad autumn weather on the baltic once ms estonia entered the stormy waters the passengers began to feel the disturbances due to the increased rolling and pitching of the ship strong wind blowing from the port was also causing problems as the ship began to list slightly to starboard unfortunately it was not only because of the wind that the ship started to lean to one side before departing it was fully loaded with vehicles and cargo but in such a way that the weight of the cargo was not arranged evenly the ship was leaning to port from the very first moment of the trip the strong wind just made it worse even though an image of a ship leaning to one side might sound terrifying it was a common thing in seamanship it was certainly not the factor that caused the disaster but once things began to go bad the uneven disposition of the cargo did its part in sinking the ship despite the bad weather and heavy waves hitting the port bow ms estonia was sailing confidently on its course with the speed of 14 knots the trip to stockholm lasted 14 hours and the captain was determined not to be late even though he departed a couple of minutes behind schedule around zero 100 hours a giant wave hit was followed by a loud metallic bang coming from the bow sailors on the storage deck reported it to the second officer on the watch who ordered the inspection of the loading ramp and the visor ms estonia had a special feature installed on the bow called the visor the visor allows the bow to articulate up and down similar to visors on motorcycle helmets allowing access to the loading ramp and cargo deck the inspection of the indicator lamps in the storage deck showed nothing wrong with neither the visor nor the loading ramp so the second officer continued the journey keeping the course at the same speed however the loud bang was just the beginning as the passengers and crew members reported more unusual sounds in the following 10 minutes at 0-115 the second officer ordered a new inspection this time there was no need for sailors to check the indicator lamps as instead of the visor there was a massive opening on the bow the visor detached from hinges letting the ramp fall open practically without the bow the water was rapidly entering the storage deck of the ship with tons of sea water in the cargo deck the ship started to list heavy to starboard an alarm was raised immediately and all four engines were shut down to reduce the ship's speed however there was practically nothing the crew could do the listing was unstoppable in just 15 minutes the ship had rolled 60 degrees and the water was breaching into upper decks the passengers were completely confused about what was going on the water was rapidly coming from all holes and the chaos erupted many passengers withdrew earlier to their cabins because of the seasickness they got during the trip a lot of them failed even to leave their cabins before the water reached them those who were alerted by the water and rolling of the ship started to run and tried to reach the upper decks the water was coming in so quickly though that it closed almost all accesses to upper decks at one point due to the breach of the water the entire ship lost the electricity people were trapped in the dark [Laughter] those who reached the upper decks began pushing life rafts and jumping into the cold water of the baltic sea the water temperature of 10 degrees celsius the rain and the turbulent sea was of no help to those who escaped the sinking ship a lot of life rafts were capsized or swallowed by waves people were floating in the freezing sea some of them wearing only light clothes once everything was over it became apparent that most of the survivors were physically strong people it took a lot of strength to overcome giant waves in the cold and merciless baltic sea at o121 ms estonia sent the first mayday signal the signal was recorded by the marine rescue coordinating center at the finnish city of turku but was very weak and unclear at 0-123 ms estonia sent a direct message to another fairy ms silja europa calling for help the third officer behind the radio on ms estonia reported a bad list and a blackout and asked for ms silja europa and other fairies to come to their assistance unfortunately due to the blackout he was unable to report the exact position of his ship still the captain of ms silja europa directed his ship toward ms estonia's route he forwarded the call for help to the nearest ferry ms mariella and other ferries in the vicinity and rescue stations in sweden and finland the third officer from ms estonia managed to send his coordinates five minutes after the first message 59 degrees 22 minutes latitude and 21 degrees 40 minutes longitude east that was the last message heard from ms estonia at that moment the list was more than 90 degrees with the starboard side completely submerged at 0-150 ms estonia disappeared from radar screens the ferry sank with the stern going down first ms mariella was the first fairy to arrive at the scene at 0-212 and find only life rafts scattered all over the place by that time ms estonia was already at the bottom of the sea soon four other ferries arrived including ms soldier europa whose captain was assigned to coordinate the rescue operations fairies launched life rafts into the water and used rescue slides to save people from the cold sea the first helicopters arrived at 0.305 playing a significant role in saving the survivors finnish helicopters transferred them to land stations while the swedes opted for a quicker but riskier solution they used cords to attach the life rafts and transfer them to ferries on the side in the end the decision proved to be on the spot as a single swedish helicopter saved more people than all fairies combined despite the brave effort of rescuers the final casualty toll was devastating on board ms estonia there were 989 people of which around 310 reached outer decks half of these succeeded in boarding life rafts in the end rescuers saved only 138 people the rest died either from drowning or from hypothermia around 650 people didn't manage to leave the ship and sank along with it it took less than an hour from the first loud sound until ms estonia sank the ship wreckage was later found lying on the seabed at a depth of 300 meters its visor was found a quarter of a mile away immediately after the disaster joint accident investigation commission from estonia finland and sweden was formed the investigation that lasted for two and a half years labeled the visor failure as the reason why ms estonia sank as stated in the report the first loud metallic noise was connected to the failure of the visor locking mechanism later sounds were probably a result of the failure of the rest of the locking mechanisms once they all failed the visor simply detached and left a massive opening on the bow allowing the water to come into the cargo deck because of the size of the gap on the bow the water flooded the deck in just a couple of minutes and incited listing to starboard the visor was recovered from the seabed and subjected to thorough testing to determine if it had any design flaws it was determined that under the condition of the low waves the strength of the visor along with its locking mechanism and hinges was completely adequate however the strong waves on september 28 1994 hitting the underside of the visor have put too much pressure on the locking devices the deck hinges and the lifting cylinder mountings due to the repeating pounding action of the waves the system simply collapsed and the visor broke off similar incidents happen on other vessels built in the same german shipyard a few years before the disaster ms diana 2 had precisely the same problem that allowed the water to ingress into the ship however the ferry crew saved the ship by reducing the vessel's speed and returning the ferry to the port as soon as the final report was published in 1997 a series of controversies erupted the first came from the german manufacturer who claimed that the visor failure was not the starting point of the sinking instead they claimed the ferry was hold on the starboard side after which the water entered the cargo deck the visor detached only after the deck was flooded indeed a 2020 underwater footage of the shipwreck recorded a 13-foot hole in the ship's hull the rupture was instantly put in connection with some earlier controversies regarding the transport of military equipment the estonian head of the commission formed to consider new findings even claimed the ship had collided with the submarine however the latest report labeled the size of the rupture too small to sink the ship in less than an hour the german designer made one more accusation against the ship owner on account of improper maintenance of the visor and ramp mechanisms for which they provided photographic evidence finally it was revealed that the ferry was not even designed to be used outside coastal waters today 17 years past the sinking of ms estonia controversy still shed light on one of the greatest fairy disasters since the sinking of the titanic i hope you found this video interesting if you did please like and subscribe see you next time

Channel: Dark Records

Views: 4,313,734

Keywords: disaster documentary, history documentary, disaster, accident documentary, seconds from disaster, worst accidents, history's greatest disasters, theme park accident, dark history, fascinating horror, plainly difficult disaster, documentary, ship sink, ship sink disaster, MS estonia, ship sink MS estonia, ship disaster, baltic sea, europe disaster, ocean tragedy, ship sink tragedy, tragedy, disasters

Id: VslQpDCUsbQ

Length: 15min 12sec (912 seconds)

Published: Fri Dec 10 2021