Herald of Free Enterprise: The Ferry That Sailed With Its Bow Door Open

On 6 March 1987, the Herald of Free Enterprise left Zeebrugge bound for Dover. Minutes later, the ferry capsized in shallow water. The cause was brutally simple: she had sailed with her bow door open.This was not a disaster of storm, collision, or war. It was a preventable failure of routine, communication, management, and safety culture. Water entered the vehicle deck, stability vanished, and 193 passengers and crew died in one of the most shocking ferry disasters of the modern era.Herald of Free Enterprise: The Ferry That Sailed With Its Bow Door Open tells the story of a familiar crossing that turned into catastrophe. It follows the route, the open bow door, the flooded vehicle deck, the sudden capsize, the rescue, the inquiry, and the phrase that came to define the disaster: a "disease of sloppiness."Part maritime history, part organisational safety case study, this book examines how an ordinary ferry journey became a permanent warning about assumption, pressure, and the deadly cost of treating routine as proof of safety.

Pagina's: 204, Paperback, Independently published