Sinking of the RMS Loughreen

The Sinking of the RMS Loughreen (Royal Myrish Ship Loughreen) was an event which took place on January 8, 1989, in which a passenger ferry originating from Merser, Gladomyr, to Staatsburg, Renesia struck an iceberg, causing it to take on water and inevitably sink over the course of an hour. Occurring during the early hours of the morning, rescue attempts were weakened in strength due to the darkness as well as initial confusion and chaos which eventually resulted in the preventable loss of several hundred more lives than were necessary. She was carrying 860 passengers, mostly hailing from Renesia, Gladomyr, and Ecoralia, and was forced to turn around back to Gladomyr due to a blockage in the East Ecoraland Canal which formed during its trip. As a result of a crucial oversight, the weather conditions in the ship's route back grew dangerously rough, to the point where steering became strenuous and any potential obstacles turned into an extremely dangerous hazard. This happened to be the case when an iceberg was spotted in the ship's path, and when a maneuver to avoid it failed, the ship struck the berg and caused an explosion within the lower decks, which further resulted in a large hole in the bow of the ferry.

The boat then slowly took on water in the lower decks, and the uneven weight distribution caused by this resulted in the ship flipping upside down before sinking rapidly. Evacuation efforts were attempted, but due to the suddenness and time, only roughly half of the lifeboats on board were deployed. A mayday call was also sent out over radio, but for a reason unknown, the message was either not heard or the seriousness of the situation was misunderstood. This brought about a delayed and unorganized rescue effort. Ecoralia, whose waters the disaster occurred in, initially rejected international help in search-and-rescue, but soon also accepted outside rescue teams to help evacuate survivors and to further investigate the wreckage. In the hours which followed the catastrophe, Renesian, Eduran, Ecoralian, Myrish, Salian, and Velorenkyan rescue helicopters, ships, and more would send aid to the site of the tragedy, patrolling for missing lifeboats which were blown away during the heavy storm and otherwise providing support. Two days after the sinking, a Renesian diving team recovered seven more survivors who had survived inside of an air pocket in the dining hall of the ship. Pieces of the wreckage were recovered from the seafloor two weeks after the incident by Myrish and Velorenkyan ships in an effort to study the cause and timeline of events that lead to the tragic loss of 749 onboard. Of all 860 who were on the ship, 111 survived the calamity.

Background
The RMS Loughreen was a which was built in 1976 in a Velorenkyan shipyard near Serrapole. In 1980, she was sold to Koghlen Company in Ordrey as the ONS Northward and operated a route between Noters and Marillon, Akerland. It was then sold again to Gralten Shipping Co. in 1984 under the Ecoralian flag before finally being sold to the Myrish Longdal & Nord in 1985 as the RMS Loughreen. The ship's most regular route was that between Merser and Staatsburg. Her namesake was the city of Loughreen in Gladomyr.

The ship left early on its trip to Staatsburg on the morning of January 8, leaving at 07:30 instead of the scheduled 07:50. The ship expected moderate weather for the majority of its trip, with moderate to severe weather being anticipated near the end. The ship was to pass through the East Ecoraland Canal at 02:30 and further reach its destination at 13:00 the same day. Due most likely to an oversight on the crew's part, weather for an emergency return back to Merser was not calculated and therefore went under the radar.

The initial journey across the Bay of Edury and Sea of Edury went exactly to plan, with overcast skies but no wind reported. She continued towards the canal into the night; notably, a boiler in the boiler room was reported to be making a "tinny, clanking" around 6 hours into its trip, with maintenance personnel being sent to inspect the boiler on multiple occasions. A maintenance note was catalogued about the strange noise and no further action was taken against it.

At 23:50, approximately 30 minutes until the Loughreen entered the canal, reports of a cargo vessel becoming stuck in one of the lochs became apparent, and a long-term closure of the canal was enacted. While some other cargo and non-commercial ships elected to wait for the closure to clear, most passenger ferries and cruises chose instead to circle and turn back to their ports of origin, the Loughreen being one of them. Due to the earlier oversight, weather conditions in the path back to Merser were expected to be as clear as they had been on their journey to the canal in the first place, with no further inquiries being proposed. At 00:10, the vessel turned around and began their trip back to Merser and announced the diversion over the PA. By this point, most occupants of the ship were asleep or resting in their staterooms.

By 01:00, it became apparent that the weather conditions had deteriorated significantly. Security cameras showed many passengers were woken up by the storm, and other passengers reported feeling seasick because of the rough waves rocking the ship. At 02:00, the waves had gotten exponentially worse, and because of the fear of loose furniture injuring passengers, the captain requested all occupants return and stay in their staterooms until further notice to avoid any injuries amongst the passengers, only ill or already injured passengers being allowed to visit the onboard hospice. The ship became extremely difficult to control during this time, with most other maritime traffic diverting to other nearby ports or canceling their trips altogether. At 02:33, the ship made its first and only call and had several minutes of conversation with the Ecoralian coast guard about the situation the Loughreen found herself in. At 02:40, the weather seemingly cleared significantly, resulting in the Loughreen concluding its conversation with the coast guard; however, in the minuted which passed, the weather conditions once again deteriorated rapidly into the worse it had been all night. Steering became impossible, and when an iceberg which had drifted from the arctic appeared in the ship's path, there was nothing the crew could do other than attempt a maneuver to avoid it. This failed, and the ship collided with the berg at 02:50.