Mikhail Lermontov
Russian Cruise Ship Sinks
February 16, 1986
With 743 people aboard cruise #561, including 372 passengers, most of them Australians, the Russian cruise ship MS Mikhail Lermontov sank on February 16, 1986.
Mikhail Lermontov sunk at Port Gore, near Wellington, New Zealand, after visiting Auckland, Tauranga, Wellington and Picton.
The ship was sailing at 15 knots, entered too shallow waters, ripping open her hull on the reef.
She had sailed for 23 years.
The weather was overcast with heavy rain and a 25 knot Southerly wind. It was early in the morning, the visibility not great, but the pilot took a path not many ships take. He sailed between Motuara Island and Ship Cove, and headed towards the Cape Jackson Lighthouse so that passengers could see the lighthouse up close. Reports say he was closer to the mainland than the lighthouse as he sailed through the Cape Jackson Passage and was dangerously close to the reef.
While the Lermontov had a draught of 8.5 feet, Jamison said he was under the impression the water through the pass had a depth of 12 feet.
About 1737 hours passengers heard a thud when the ship hit Hawea Rock and the ship started to list, with a 40-foot-long gash in her hull, that penetrated three water-tight bulkheads. The engines stopped when the water shorted out the electricity aboard.
Passengers say that thud and the listing, along with seeing crew members wearing life jackets, was the only sign they got that something was wrong. There was no announcement.
However, passengers say they did hear an announcement that supper would be delayed one hour and that the wine tasting in progress would continue. Just like with the Titanic, the band continued to play. But, when the listing became more severe and wine glass went flying, the wine tasting ended.
A Mayday call went out and the L.P.G. Tanker Tarihiko quickly navigated to the scene. Then, the radio cracked with the message that no assistance was needed. The Russian captain, Captain Vladislav Vorobyev, doing as most Russians did in the day, quickly tried to conceal the disaster. Russia would later give him a four year prison term, that was suspended.
Just in case, Captain Reedman of the Tarihiko continued his path. Upon arrival, the Tarihiko crew saw passengers being evacuated into lifeboats, the elderly jumping from the sinking ship were gettting injured as they landed in the lifeboats. One passsenger had fallen into the water when he jumped, and took two hours to be found and pulled to safety.
The Tarihiko took all crew and passengers aboard as the cruise ship took on a 12° list and drifted into Port Gore where Captain Vorobyev tried to beach his ship. A few hours later she had listed to 40° starboard.
One crew member, the engineer Parvee Zagliadimov went down with the ship.
Since most of the signs on the ship were in Russian or German, passengers in their cabins found it hard to make their way topside, as automatic doors locked tight and crew stairs had to be used to get to the upper decks.
Captain Don Jamison, 52, with 15 years of experience on the job, was the New Zealand pilot aboard the Russian cruise ship. An inquiry would find that he was responsible for sinking the ship. Jamison would later say he had been working 80 hours a week for the four months before the accident and was mentally and physically exhausted.
The investigation would also find that at a reception before he boarded the bridge of the cruise ship, he had drank two vodka drinks and a beer, though would claim he was not impaired. After arriving on the bridge, he stumbled, fell and hit his head.
He had taken the ship within a few hours of departing Picton to her final resting place. He had three close calls along the way, which took the ship perilously close to the shoreline and then he made the decision to take the Lermontov through a passage which had never been used by ships of its size.
New Zealand law at the time meant that New Zealand-registered pilots working
