CHAPTER 40

THE YEAR 1997

The JAIC finally managed to complete their Report and publish the English version together with 2 Supplements on 3 December while the Swedish version took another year. Before the publication, however, many things happened which shall be explained in the following Subchapters.

40.1
The Development until May 1997

January: Due to the illness of Börje Stenström the position of the technical head of the JAIC was apparently taken over by Tuomo Karppinen assisted by Mikael Huss and Klaus Rahka. Karppinen phoned on 17 January and reported the following:
- They are still making small changes to the report. They had the lugs of the Atlantic lock at VTT and have analysed the paint layers. They found some 7-8, grey, white, red, blue paint and are certain now that the lugs were on board for quite some time.
- They have also spoken to the Turku yard, who stated, never to have painted the forepeak deck area, thus it must have been the crew.
- Have told him about the change of shape and he said the lugs from board have the same shape as the von Tell drawing and as the mock-up during the break tests, which is correct except that the aft part is vertically cut off.
- He is unable to give an estimate when their report might be completed, a lot depends on the meeting next week.

The JAIC met in Helsinki on 24/25 January and continued to discuss the final version of the Report. The protocol of the previous meeting on 16/17 December in Pårnu was distributed. It reveals that Kari Lethola had spoken to Edelmann/F.B.N. who had told him that there were two persons in the administration, who knew that there was a "problem" with accepting the bow ramp as upper extension of the collision bulkhead, but that it was common practice to do so.
This protocol further reveals that Tuomo Karppinen had contact to a Mr. Mäkälainen, who had stated that locking devices had been changed and that Uno Laur had demanded a written statement from this man. The person is unknown to this 'Group of Experts' and nothing about him is mentioned in the JAIC Report. This and other protocols finally reveal, that the Sjöfartsverket "observer" Sten Andersson actively participated in the drafting of the Final Report. He was obviously treated as a commission member and apparently did behave like that. Enn Neidre participated also.
From one of the relative organisations the information was received that the handling of the ESTONIA case by the Swedish Government had been moved away from the Ministry for Communication and Transport (Minister Inez Uzman) to the Ministry of Defence - "Department for Psychological Defence".

February: The JAIC met again in Helsinki on 19/20 February. The discussion of the chapters of the final Report was continued and Enn Neidre attended again. On 21 February Tuomo Karppinen phoned again and reported about the results of the meeting:
- In principle they do agree on the contents of all the chapters - they however have to be proof-read.
- But they did not agree on the conclusions and recommendations. Therefore they will meet again on 12 March and remain together until everything is agreed.
- The conclusion will be that one wave impact broke the visor at 01.00 hours.
- All attachments including the hinges broke a few minutes after 01.00 hours.
- The first water on the car deck was at 01.10.12.
- Then it took about 10 minutes for the visor to cut through the deck beams and then the ramp was pulled open.
- 01.20/22 the main engines stopped, vessel started to drift, starboard side to the wind.
- Only two passengers have reported water in the 1st deck.
Note: Actually 9 survivors reported water on the 1st deck, of which two already before the big heel.
- At 01.30 hours ESTONIA was on the side.
On 25 February Klaus Rahka reported the following:
- He wanted the report from the Institute for all the break tests performed (was sent to him).
- He promised to send a copy of the final findings (which he never did).
- They ignored the passenger video - see Subchapter 39.3 - because the pictures are jumping too much. It was explained to him that the pictures did not jump on the copy which was jointly viewed in Helsinki, but he was not interested. His attention was drawn to the fact that the starboard hinge bolt was standing without bushing on the rail, which confirmed that the bushing cannot have been complete as otherwise it couldn't have fallen off the bolt and would have remained attached to the bolt as evidently the point bushing did. He was not interested, the decision had already been made jointly.
- They had come to the conclusion that the load on the visor was about 60 ts which was sufficient to break all the locks.
- He believes that the welding seams of the 1st mock-up had been 5 mm instead of 3 mm.
- Börje Stenström had now officially resigned from the case. Note: Börje Stenström passed away on 25 February.

March: On 5 March Tuomo Karppinen faxed page 13 of the Draft Report and requested details about the communication between the yard/ BV/ von Tell, etc. which was complied with by sending the respective chapter of the Report of this 'Group of Experts'. From 12-16 March the JAIC met again to finalize the Report which failed, although - as stated above - it had been the intention to stay together until the last disputes were solved. On 17 March "DAGENS NYHETER" as well as "SVENSKA DAGBLADET" published articles about the internal disputes in the JAIC between Estonia on the one side and Sweden/Finland on the other concerning the behaviour of the crew, respectively how much blame was to be put on the crew. Furthermore, the attention of the public was drawn to the letter Stenström wrote at the beginning of December 1996 to Dr. Holtappels indicating that the JAIC would not point to Meyer Werft having installed the faulty locks by not excluding that the installations could have been changed after the vessel had left the yard.

April: At the beginning of this month the stowage plan showing the reconstruction of the condition on the car deck according to the cargo manifest was sent from Hamburg to Helsinki. In exchange, a copy of the KTH-Report about the examination of the hinge material was received.
During the second half of this month a contact to the Turku Repair Yard was established which resulted after some time in the receipt of very valuable documentation, i.e. the repair-specifications, -quotations and invoices concern-ing the time before, during and after the take-over of the ferry by N&T - see Subchapter 3.4.
Tuomo Karppinen phoned on 23 April and requested help with regard to
- the memo on magnetic limit switches (made up by the Estonian JAIC - see Enclosure 12.5.172);
- type of these switches, names/telephone numbers of the electricians having installed them;
all of which was sent to him.
In exchange he sent the Leif Bogren and the Hangö statements, which were received the following day.
He reported further that proof-reading and lay-out of the Report would not be completed before the end of May, i.e. the Report might be printed before midsummer, thus could be published just before the vacation season begins, which the JAIC would prefer.
At a meeting on 18 April with the Stockholm public relations company H&H the idea was developed to present the findings of this 'Group of Experts' to the Swedish public at an exhibition in Stockholm at the same time when the Report of the JAIC was presented and the media and the public could come to the exhibition and check, compare and discuss the results. This was decided during the following days and the time was set for the week before midsummer, which left two months for preparations.

May: Tuomo Karppinen phoned on 6 May and stated that
- they were still proof-reading;
- they had planned some sort of seminar under the chairmanship of Prof. Rutgersson from KTH in Stockholm where they wanted to present their technical findings to raise the profile of the JAIC, however this can, of course, only be done after the publication of their final report, which will probably be during the week before midsummer.
On 16 May Karppinen phoned again and told that they were making good progress, about half of the Report was already in the printing house in Helsinki. The day before they had gone through part of the Report with their English language expert. It is most unlikely that they will attend the seminar. It is still under consideration between Kari Lethola, Uno Laur and Olof Forssberg whether this 'Group of Experts' will get the part of their Report dealing with Meyer Werft matters.
On 20 May journalist Anders Hellberg from DAGENS NYHETER reported that the seminar had been postponed.

40.1.1
The Dismissal of Olof Forssberg

On 26 May the interview quote below by radio journalist Erik Ridderstolpe with Olof Forssberg was broadcasted in Swedish Radio:

Journalist (J), Olof Forssberg (OF)
"Speaker: The Swedish chairman of the JAIC has lied about a letter concerning important facts about why Estonia and other vessels were built in an incorrect way. Despite the fact that Olof Forssberg has been assigned by the government to lead the commission's work in trying to establish the truth behind the sinking of Estonia, he has repeatedly lied.

J: So you have never seen this letter?
OF: No.
J: Never at all?
OF: No. It must have been delivered faulty. I will receive a new copy on Monday ... It wasn't today's mail.
J: Isn't that strange since the letter was sent to you a long time ago.
OF: These things happen. The post is not always reliable.
J: So you haven't seen what this letter contains at all?
OF: No.
Speaker Olof Forssberg is chairman of the JAIC. He is the one responsible for establishing the truth behind the catastrophe. He has already been heavily criticised for his way of handling the investigation. This time the issue is sensitive information about the Sjöfartsverket. It is information that shows that Sjöfartsverket for many years didn't control the placement of the very important collision bulkhead that shall prevent water from entering the car deck in an emergency situation. If Estonia's collision bulkhead had been placed in the right position, the vessel would never have sunk. Olof Forssberg has received and read the letter, but had not registered it. He has deliberately or non-deliberately misplaced the letter. At least one other occasion he has denied that he has received the letter, and he has asked the sender to sent the letter again just so that it would seem as if he had never received it.

J: But I just can't understand why you are lying?
OF: I can't understand it either and I must say that I am ashamed over having lied. I have no explanation. I regret that I have been handling the truth carelessly. The reason I have asked you to come here today is partly that I want to explain that I have been lying and also apologise to you.
J: Is this common behaviour for the chairman of the JAIC?
OF: Absolutely not. It goes without saying that the answer to that question is no.
J: Is this the way you normally handle documents?
OF: Absolutely not. I always register documents very carefully. Actually I think that the reason for this omission, or rather consequence of, was the fact that the person who handles the Estonia file was on vacation.
J: How do you think this affects the credibility of the JAIC?
OF: This is what concerns me most. There have been a few occasions where I not even today can understand why I have acted with such a lack of judgement in certain situations.
J: The motive behind this is still not quite clear. Why did you lie about the letter?
OF: ..I...the..hm..I don't think that the motive is unclear. Quite simply this document was received or I read it through and I put it somewhere and then I didn't think anymore about it.
J: But it is one thing to do that, and quite another to deny the existence of the document. And also you don't have the document here in your office.
OF: ...n..ne...I...I don't know where it is right now, the letter has now been miscarried but that is not a problem since I have asked the sender to send the same letter once more.
J. That you did in order to look good and so that you could say that you had now received the letter.
OF: I have now explained the whole situation to you and I think that, well, that things are as they are."

The subject of the discussion which subsequently turned out to be the reason for the dismissal of Olof Forssberg by Minister Inez Uzman is attached as Enclosure 2.2.3. It is a letter concerning a directors' meeting at Sjöfartsverket dated 07.04.59.

On 28 May Tuomo Karppinen phoned and reported the following:
- Ridderstolpe from Swedish Radio had phoned Forssberg and asked whether he had received a paper from 1959, of which he, Karppinen, also has a copy. Forssberg's answer was no, although he knew that he had the copy but could not find it. He asked Sjöfartsverket to send the letter again which was, however, delayed. So he told Ridderstolpe that he did not have it and never saw it and was subsequently proven to have lied. The first letter was not registered because it was considered unimportant. Ridderstolpe got a tip from somebody inside Sjöfartsverket.
- General Director of "Statens Havarie Kommission" (SHK) is a full time job. In case the Government should decide to put an outsider in this position, it will take several months and will cause further delay to the publication of the Report. Therefore it has to be assumed that it will be somebody from the Government administration.
- He has sent two more Chapters to the printing house.
- They are still of the opinion that it all started with the failure of the visor locking devices on course 287° and full speed, but some within the JAIC believe that it started with the hinges.

Olof Forssberg was dismissed from his position as Chairman of the JAIC on 27 May and replaced by Ann-Louise Eksborg on 16 June. The lady had been working in the legal department of the Ministry of Defence before. Also on the same day Captain Olle Noord, nautical expert up to that time, was appointed member in replacement of Börje Stenström, i.e. now two master mariners were members (Rosengren and Noord). Naval architects were no more present in the JAIC, which, however, did not mean that more emphasis was put on the up to then widely neglected nautical aspects of the case. Olof Forssberg attended for the last time at a working meeting of the Swedish part of the JAIC on 4 June.
Note: Olof Forssberg was very soon appointed an appeal court judge. One wonders.

40.2
The First Exhibition in Stockholm

40.2.1
Preparations

The investigation events were summarized in a brochure in English and Swedish languages - the English version is attached as Enclosure 40.2 - which were distributed to the visitors. In further preparation, two exhibition guides were acquainted with the investigation results, these were
- from Sweden, Captain Erland von Hofsten, 68 years old, retired Stena Line captain and Chairman of the Swedish Sailors Foundation, and
- from Finland, Captain Peter Jansson, 53 years old, maritime consultant and owner of Oy Mariners Assistance, Porvoo.
Both spent one week in Hamburg, read through the material, viewed the videos and discussed open questions with this 'Group of Experts'.
For the exhibition the history of the vessel from newbuilding to sinking was illustrated on big paper sheets. In addition, the topics of the investigation, e.g. the passenger video, the condition of the visor hinges, etc. were illustrated on separate sheets. Furthermore, one of the mock-ups of the Atlantic locks, broken at the break test, a model of the "VIKING SALLY", models of intact and damaged visor hinges, the hinge mock-up with the burning test, numerous drawings and other documentations of interest were shown at the exhibition which took place in the "Gamla Spårvägshallarna" on Birger Jarlsgatan in the centre of Stockholm.
While the preparations were in progress the chairman of the Swedish JAIC, Olof Forssberg, was dismissed, which triggered off a wave of speculations and, last but not least, caused a new delay of the publication of the JAIC Report. After careful consideration of all circumstances it was decided to continue with the preparations and to open the exhibition - as planned - on Thursday, 12 June, because it was possible by this exhibition to fill the gap which had doubtlessly been created by the new postponement of the publication of the JAIC Report.

40.2.2
The Exhibition

The Exhibition was opened on 12 June at 10.00 hours with a presentation for invited guests. Invitations had been sent to the JAIC chairman, members of the Government and of Parliament. About 30 persons of the invited persons appeared, among others:
- Lennart Berglund/Odd Lundqvist - SEA Relative Organisation
- Gunnar Benndreus/Henning Witte/Alve Wendt - DIS Relative Organisation
- Prosecutor Tomas Lindstrand
- Sjöfartsverket Director Johann Fransson
- Jörgen Almelöv - Lawyer of N&T
- Carl Romare - Skuld / Stockholm
- Lawyers from Skuld / Estline / ESCO
- one representative of Trygg Hansa - the leading Hull Underwriters of "ESTONIA"
- Pierre Frey of Bureau Veritas/Paris
- Bureau Veritas Stockholm - Lawyer Bengt-Åke Johnsson.

No one from the JAIC, the Government or the Parliament appeared.
About 50 journalists attended the following press conference. They came mainly from Sweden, but also from Estonia, Finland, Denmark, Norway and Germany. Various TV and radio programs were present with own teams and a considerable number of interviews were made. On the next morning, however, there were only small articles in SVENSKA DAGBLADET and TT NEWS, while TV 1 and TV 4 mentioned the exhibition briefly in their evening news. The question arose why the Swedish media were suddenly so disinterested. Nevertheless the Swedish public, informed about the exhibition by various advertisements, had a different opinion and visited the exhibition in daily growing members while the media remained silent. Only in DAGENS NYHETER on the "Debate" page did one letter from the N&T lawyer, Jörgen Almelöv, appear, which was written in response to the letter of Dr. Holtappels having been published on the same page the day before the exhibition was opened. Among the daily increasing number of visitors were retired captains, pilots, professors from the Royal Technical High Schools in Stockholm and Gothenburg, but also relatives, survivors and previous passengers. Even the master, the chief mate and the chief engineer from "REGINA BALTICA", the ferry having replaced the ESTONIA, visited the exhibition twice and took information material with them.
The Finnish JAIC chairman Kari Lethola came with two assistants and stayed for 11/2 hours, the investigating public prosecutor Tomas Lindstrand came twice with criminal inspector Bo Wide. Both stayed for several hours. Also several employees of Sjöfartsverket appeared and very interesting discussions took place. Most important were the many statements taken from previous passengers, in particular truck drivers, which provided new and more detailed evidence about the disastrous condition of visor and bow ramp including hinges and locking devices, all of which were incorporated into the report of this 'Group of Experts'. See Subchapters 12.4.3 / 12.5.
On the last day the relatives organisation DIS held their press conference inside the exhibition to demonstrate their appreciation for the work of this 'Group of Experts' and its preparedness to show the results in Stockholm.
At the exit of the exhibition a black book had been waiting for entries by visitors about their impressions and feelings after having seen the exhibition and the result was overwhelming as demonstrated by the Swedish original and the English translation attached as Enclosures 40.2.480 / 40.2.480.1.
On Thursday, 19 June, the day before the Midsummer celebrations would commence, the exhibition was closed after having been open for 7 full days, during which approximately 1200 visitors saw the exhibition.
In summary it has to be concluded that the exhibition had been a great success, in spite of the silence of the media. The visitors appreciated the opportunity to study the history of the vessel from design/construction to the sinking, the many photos, drawings, the models and mock-up, all of which was explained to them, if they wished so. Many regretted what they thought was a too early closing, however, accepted the reasons, viz. that it would make little sense to kept he exhibition open through Midsummer. Many visitors urged the exhibition guides to request Mr. Bernard Meyer urgently to make sure that the exhibition would be made available again to the Swedish public once the JAIC would finally publish their report. Many visitors demanded a new diving investigation to establish the real truth of the catastrophe.
It became obvious that the Swedish public and in particular the relatives did realize that this 'Group of Experts' - contrary to all publications and assumptions - really had done their utmost to uncover the real facts and circumstances having led to the catastrophe, and still continues to do so as demonstrated at the exhibition. The message from many relatives and survivors, that it is of utmost importance to them to know, what really happened, was understood and, also, that they felt to be left absolutely alone by their authorities.
Furthermore, it was realised and accepted that there was serious and convincing evidence available indicating a much better and more logical casualty scenario than that published so far by the JAIC.
The visitors also understood that a substantial part of the responsibility for the catastrophe was resting with their own Sjöfartsverket and many did express their deep concern about it. The recent resignation of the Swedish JAIC chairman Olof Forssberg in this connection did increase the ill feelings of many visitors.
Basically it became clear to most visitors that the main blame was resting with the technical managers and part owners N&T, the crew managers and part owners ESCO and the classification society Bureau Veritas. Many visitors were shocked that the ferry in such condition could depart every 2nd day from a Swedish port with 1000 or more Swedes onboard, without any Swedish authority doing anything to prevent it.

The Swedish Government, when faced with the facts shown at the exhibition, reacted as follows:
- The responsible Minister of Communication, Inez Uzman, remained silent and did not attend.
- The same refers to the members of the Swedish JAIC (only the expert Mikael Huss visited the exhibition in his own time).
- The only "officials" were Johan Fransson from Sjöfartsverket and prosecutor Tomas Lindstrand.