The 12-tonne bow ramp was salvaged from Estonia. The head of the investigation now believes they have a definitive answer as to why the passenger ferry sank in 1994.
Originally, part of the ship was to be picked up at lunchtime on Monday, but the work was postponed because further excavation was required to prevent its destruction.
By 2 p.m. Tuesday, the bow ramp had been restored, news agency TT reported.
He will now be flown to Estonia for check-ups.
It was the failure of the locks on the bow door – which sat in front of the ramp – that has been cited as the proximate cause of the sinking on September 28, 1994.
It is the third consecutive summer that accident commissions in Sweden, Finland and Estonia have investigated the wreck. The Norwegian underwater vessel Viking Reach also helps. Work continued around the clock for five days when the ton section was raised.
852 have died
The Estonia was en route from Tallinn, Estonia, to Stockholm when it capsized midway in the Baltic Sea and sank in less than an hour.
852 people lost their lives, including 501 Swedes. 137 people were rescued. Among the dead were six Norwegians.
The bow port was raised a few weeks after the sinking, while the rest of the wreck lies at a depth of about 80 metres.
The documentary brought new scrutiny
In the documentary “Estonia – The Discovery That Changes Everything” from 2020, two unknown holes in the ship’s hull were discovered, including a four-meter gash below the ship’s waterline. The filmmakers defied the ban on diving to film the wreck.
After the documentary was shown on television, the accident investigation boards of Sweden, Finland and Estonia launched a new investigation.
more than they had hoped
According to TT, investigators have now brought back the materials they were hoping to get — and some more.
– This worked out better than expected, and we were able to do more than we dared to expect, says Jonas Backstrand, Investigations Lead at the Swedish Accident Investigation Board.
Among other things, the investigators were able to shoot more in the car’s tire than they expected. In addition, they salvaged a window and cut a portion of the sheet at the openings that were discovered in the structure in 2020.
graveyard
Bäckstrand describes working on the site as challenging, because it could also be seen as a burial ground for the dead.
He doesn’t think further diving into the wreck will be necessary, but says it depends to some extent on what results come out. There is now enough information to say for sure what caused the sinking of Estonia, according to the head of the investigation.
– In general, I fully believe that this will be enough, he says.
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