II NORDSTRÖM & THULIN AND THE STOCKHOLM-TALLINN SERVICE

CHAPTER 5

THE HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT

Nordström & Thulin AB is a Stockholm-based public company, established in 1850, with extensive experience in the worldwide operation of large modern tankers and bulk carriers. Also passenger ferry operations between the Swedish mainland and the island of Gotland in the Baltic Sea belonged to the business and shipbroking is another important company activity.

In the light of the changes in the Soviet Union in 1988 the Board of Nordström & Thulin (N&T) decided to investigate the possibilities for a car/ passenger service between Stockholm and Tallinn and in early spring 1989 Hans Laidwa, a born Estonian, took up his work.

Laidwa's business was to investigate the possibilities of opening a ferry traffic between Stockholm and Tallinn. N&T's plans had a positive response in Stockholm and Tallinn, but the decisions - as far as Estonia was concerned - at that time were still being made in Moscow. The Soviet authorities would among other things have to tolerate that passengers on short cruises to Tallinn would not need visas, which was finally accepted.

N&T received the exclusive right for the passenger traffic between Tallinn and Stockholm from the Estonian side for a guaranteed period of 10 years. This was necessary for the long-term planning of investments, because N&T had to take care of all investments in vessels, in terminals and project preparations and also to conduct the ferry line with own personnel.

For the new activities N&T formed the company N&T Estline AB, and appointed Hans Laidwa its managing director. The Danish passenger ferry MV DANA REGINA, which for many years had been employed in the traffic between Copenhagen and Oslo, was purchased, renamed NORD ESTONIA and put under Swedish flag. The ferry left Stockholm on 16 June 1990 on her historical first tour and a very euphoric summer was commenced. The picture of the city of Tallinn was changing and many of the Soviet restrictions were breaking down through the influence of the numerous tourists visiting the city. The first song festival after 50 years took place without approval from Moscow and it was the first time in 50 years that people from all over Estonia could meet friends and relatives from other parts of the country.

After the summer of 1990 a difficult time began, and with the darkness and cold of winter came harder political signals which culminated in the bloody events in Vilnius and Riga in January 1991 and also the Estonians were prepared to build barricades and to fight for their independence.

To this dark picture also contributed the murder of two Swedish union leaders in Tallinn. MV NORD ESTONIA was more or less sailing empty during the winter and spring of 1991, a situation which only gradually changed in the less than 2 years that the NORD ESTONIA would remain in this service.

 

5.1
Company Structure and Activities

N&T is one of the oldest shipping companies in Sweden and is noted on the Stockholm Exchange. The office is located at Skeppsbron in the old City of Stockholm, where ca. 50 people were working.

The main activities in1994 were

Shipping
Sales & Purchase
Broking and Chartering

with the main activities being concentrated on broking and sales & purchases.

The management in 1994 consisted of

Details can be taken from the company structure attached as Enclosure 5.1.107.

 

5.2
The Relevant Staff and AB Hornet

The Director of the Shipping Department - Rederi Afdeling - was, and still is, Sten-Christer Forsberg, born in 1945. His CV is attached as Enclosure 5.2.108.
He was practically the Fleet Manager directly responsible to the Managing Director Ronald Bergmann. Forsberg had worked together with Börje Stenström († 2/1997), then the head of the Technical Group of the JAIC, and Kaj Janérus, then the General Director of Sjöfartsverket, some years ago for the Salén Group.
In relation to the NORD ESTONIA and the ESTONIA the next one in the line of responsibility was Ulf Hobro, born in 1948 (CV see Enclosure 5.2.109), employed by N&T as marine superintendent since mid 1990, i.e. after the NORD ESTONIA had taken up her service to Tallinn. Hobro had been employed as safety inspector with Sjöfartsverket before he had joined this organisation after having sailed as 1st engineer and chief engineer with Rederi AB Gotland on the large car/passenger ferries

Gotland - 1973-1978
Gute - 1978-1979
Visby - 1980-1987

trading between Visby on Gotland and Nynåshamn south of Stockholm.

On 12 November 1973 - when Hobro was sailing as 1st engineer on the GOTLAND for the same owners and in the same trade - the VISBY suffered serious failure of the locking devices of her bow door on way from Nynåshamn to Visby and returned to Nynåshamn due to water on the car deck.
Rederi AB Gotland was taken over by N&T in 1988 and Hans Laidwa, who later built up the Stockholm-Tallinn service, became managing director. Several years ago the VISBY was sold to the Larvik Line and has been sailing ever since between Larvik and Frederikshamn as the PETER WESSEL.
When the name DANA REGINA was changed to NORD ESTONIA and the flag from Danish to Swedish, Ulf Hobro was still employed with Sjöfartsverket and was the responsible safety inspector controlling all the many new requirements following the change from Danish to Swedish flag.

Note:

Although also DANA REGINA respectively NORD ESTONIA had no upper extension of the collision bulkhead above bulkhead deck at the location required by SOLAS and, although, she proceeded more than 20 nm off the nearest land in the course of her route between Stockholm and Tallinn, Sjöfartsverket issued and annually renewed an unrestricted PSSC, thereby confirming that she did comply with SOLAS 1974, the same as B.V. had done for the ESTONIA on behalf of the Estonian National Maritime Board (E.N.M.B.).

S.-C.Forsberg explained his organisation in a letter to the criminal police Stockholm dated 01.11.1994 as follows:

»Internal Organisation
The shipping department deals with the following functions:
- operation
- seagoing personnel
- technical inspection
- insurance.

In the shipping department we also deal with such external management contracts as the one which referred to the ESTONIA. We also have similar contracts with OK Petroleum and Neste Oy. Ulf Hobro, technical superintendent, and Lennart Klevberg, in charge of the purchase of spare parts, are employed with the shipping department Operation & Technique. The shipping department of N&T has also engaged personnel from the independent entity Rederi AB Hornet, e.g. for technical follow-up work on board. This situation is not unusual. In the shipping business it is more the rule than the exception that part of owners' employees are engaged from ship management companies. The idea is that certain entities become specialised with vast experience and knowledge and take over the activities which otherwise the shipping company employees themselves would have carried out.«

The full wording of the letter together with a translation is attached as Enclosure 5.2.110.

This was the situation within N&T when in the early summer of 1992 the decision was made to replace the Swedish flag/Swedish crew NORD ESTONIA by a larger but cheaper ferry. Some time later the WASA KING was picked out to be the successor, however, under Estonian flag with Estonian crew.