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Radio and sounds recordings from Viking Sigyn from the moment of the accident
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Tragic details were unveiled during the investigation of the capsized tourist boat. The accident’s timeline was reconstructed with the help of radio and sound recordings.
Based on radio communication and sound recordings, Magyar Nemzet gives a detailed breakdown of the collision between the Viking Sigyn and the Hableány that took place on the 29th of May and resulted in the sinking of the latter.
According to Navinfo Rádió’s dispatcher, the Ukrainian captain of Viking Sigyn was in a state of distress and confusion when he contacted Navinfo Rádió a couple of minutes after the collision. The captain, Yuriy Chaplinsky, was talking unintelligibly in English, German and Russian at the same time. The dispatcher and his companion could only understand that a severe accident happened. Testimonies support the suspicion that the captain was in shock after he realised that people died because of his mistake.
Checking the AIS data of the ships in the vicinity, the dispatcher realised that the Sigyn sunk the Hableány and from the radio transmissions they found out that people fell into the Danube.
Magyar Nemzet writes that based on all of the evidence that the paper has gathered, the Viking Sigyn caught up with Hableány at the middle bay of Margaret Bridge, on its Pest side, while overtaking it irregularly, upstream bound. According to the laws of sailing, the captain of the ship that intends to pass the one in front of it has to contact the captain of the latter. In this case, Chaplinsky should have established radio contact with László Lombos, the late captain of Hableány.
Furthermore, the law forbids the passing of more than one craft through a bridge bay – the captain of the Sigyn broke this rule too, as he sailed into the bay immediately after the Hableány.
After this, the Sigyn crashed with Hableány, ripping it under itself and sinking it in 7 seconds.
The captain woke up the Romanian mate of the Sigyn through the phone, telling him that an accident has happened. The mate said that he rushed to the steering station immediately where he found the captain in shock, so he took over the steering of Sigyn.
The navigational tools and the sound recordings of the steering station provide a detailed picture of the catastrophe’s timeline: