More than two-thirds of our planet's surface is ocean. Humanity has had a complicated relationship with it since ancient times. The desire to dominate, to feel like a conqueror too often turns into unforeseen and sad consequences.
An example of an offensive-aggressive attitude to the aquatic environment is the Aral Sea. The disaster happened in the sixties, half a century ago it occupied the fourth largest among closed reservoirs after Victoria, the Great Lakes and the Caspian Sea, two ports worked on its shores, industrial fishing was carried out, and tourists rested on the beaches. Today, unfortunately, the only reminders of this prosperity are ships lying helplessly in keels on the sand. The victory of such a completion of relations with the aquatic environment somehow does not turn the language.
The ocean is harsh, it can also be cruel. Disasters at sea have occurred since the crews of the first ships ventured on a long and dangerous journey. Even experienced sailors know that luck is changeable, and therefore they often believe in omens and are superstitious.
In terms of the number of victims of a disaster at sea, they are inferiorroad traffic, rail and air transport, but this makes them no less terrible. The death of the Titanic in 1912 (1503 victims), the liner "Empress of Ireland" in 1914 (1012 victims), the pleasure steamer "Eastland" (more than 1300 victims), the Randas ferry in 1947 (625 deaths), ferries "Taiping" and "Jin-Yuan" in 1949 (over 1500 went to the bottom) - this is a short list of only the first half of the 20th century.
Later there were other disasters at sea, including the death of the nuclear submarines "Thresher" and "Kursk". They caused hundreds of deaths.
Over the past three decades, sixteen large-tonnage tourist ships have gone under water. Due to technical malfunctions, errors, and sometimes neglect of important safety rules, the ferry "Estonia", "Costa Concordia" died.
Especially shocking disasters in the Black Sea, which is considered shallow and relatively safe. The mysterious explosion in peacetime on the battleship "Novorossiysk" in 1955, which claimed the lives of 614 Soviet sailors, the collision with the dry cargo ship "Peter Vasev" of the steamer "Admiral Nakhimov" (423 dead) are comparable to the losses in the death of the "Lenin" or torpedoed transport under Nazi bombs Soviet boat of the German ship "Goya" in 1945.
Experienced sailors consider the most terrible of all possible causes of a disaster at sea, paradoxical as it sounds, fire. It seems that the fire is easy to put out when there is so much water around, but this is notso. In 1967, an air-to-air missile was fired aboard the aircraft carrier USS James Forrestal. Airplanes ready for combat missions caught fire, the fire brigade started extinguishing, but the ammunition spontaneously ignited earlier than it was required by the regulations. Burning kerosene flowed from the broken tanks, which the sailors tried to extinguish with outboard water. Since the sailors trained in firefighting died in the explosion, the survivors did not know that this could not be done. As a result, flaming fuel penetrated into the cockpit where the crew members were sleeping.
Will the list of those taken by the sea continue? How big will the losses be in the 21st century? Until we know it. What is known for sure is that the ocean does not forgive mistakes and carelessness.
