Sure thing. It appears the Captain chose to press on to destination
vs. come about in the sea condition that prevailed, despite fire on
board. Overall vessel condition was apparently poor on this ro/ro
ferry, and design not seaworthy for the seas she normally traversed in
this Red Sea routing if weather turned poor. Two additional decks
added after original build caused inherent loss of stability.
Overloaded with passengers (common with many ferries throughout the
world in daily operations) who fled the fire may have been enough
additonal instability to lead to the chain of events, rapidly bringing
her down. No confirmation yet of when Captain left the ship.

Prior service in Med was cut short after the Estonia incident gave
Euros reason to change design safety standards. I suppose some would
point finger at Western Europe for not scrapping this vessel, but
that's the way of the world it seems. There is alway a market as long
as she floats and mechanicals will allow her to make decent way.


Pascal wrote:
Thank You for the information; I found it vvery helpfull.

Regrads

Pascal

Consider a fire on the vehicle deck. If they fought that fire with the use
of large amounts of water and no consideration to getting that water clear
of the deck then the potential loss of stability due to free surface effect
would be considerable.

otnmbrd wrote:
Consider a fire on the vehicle deck. If they fought that fire with the use
of large amounts of water and no consideration to getting that water clear
of the deck then the potential loss of stability due to free surface effect
would be considerable.

An important factor at 60 pounds per cu. ft.

We can rest assured that when the Panamanians fully investigate, the
cause will be attributed primarily to human error. She passed all
recent inspections, you know, and these guys have thousands of vessels
under their flag, so they really know the score!