| Ship description.
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The Estonia was originally built for Sally Line by Joseph L Meyer of Papenburg in 1980 and entered service under the name Viking Sally in 1980. She served with them until 1990 and then briefly operated for Silja Line as Silja Star and then as Wasa King for EffJohn International from 1990 till 1992. In 1992 she was purchased by Estonia/Nordström & Thulin (Sweden) and Estonian Shipping Company and started operating for EstLine under the name Estonia.
She was 157 m long with a breadth of 24,2m and a draught of 5,56m. She could carry 1400 passengers and 422 cars and trucks. A bow door with a visor and a stern door facilitated loading of vehicles.
Name sequence: Viking Sally, Silja Star, Wasa King, Estonia.
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Viking Sally.
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| Causes of and factors contributing to the loss of the Estonia.
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On 27 September 1994, the ship was making a routine crossing between Estonia and Sweden when disaster struck. Having sailed from Tallinin for Stockholm she encountered rough weather, not enough to stop the ship but bad enough to make the crossing bumpy. Shortly after midnight, engineers on watch noticed water entering the car hold on their monitors. Not realising the seriousness of the problem they only activate the bilgepumps and don't investigate too closely. A loud thump had been heard earlier on but few people could even guess where it had come from. The water continued to pour into the ship and she started to list to port. At roughly 01.20 she is in serious trouble as the water is flowing in from what appears to be the bow doors. The list increased further and the engines fail. At 01.22 am she sends out a mayday but by 01.30 she is laying over on her side, passengers scrambling for safety, the end very close. At roughly 01.50 she sinks, taking with her many passengers who are trapped in their cabins and leaving many adrift in the cold stormy seas. By 03.00 helicopters arrive and try pluck passengers from rafts and wreckage. Ships are coming to their aid but they will be too late to help many. Only 137 people out of 989 on board survive the disaster.
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Estonia with open visor.
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| Aftermath and Investigation.
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From the start maritime officals suspected that the bow visor had failed, causing the bow door to be broached by the rough seas. A joint Estonian/Finnish/Swedish Accident Investigation Commission (JAIC) was set up on 29 September 1994, to investigate the disaster, their findings tended to confirm the bow visor failure. However, many have questioned the validity of these findings, citing that many questions which should have been asked were never asked and that diving operations seemed to be avoiding any real issues. The official investigation findings tended to substantiate the cause of the flooding being the loss of the visor, whereas in mnay quarters it is felt that the visor was lost as a result of the accident and that the real cause of the disaster was not properly investigated. Conspiracy theories abound and if the JAIC report is discounted then the question of what caused the initial flooding which caused the ship to go down has not been answered. What is clear is that she took on enough water to seriously affect her stability, the loss of stability coupled with the bad weather resulted in what was a well found ship to capsize and sink with a terrible loss of life.
Recommended websites on the Estonia.
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