The Disappearance of MS München

The Ship

MS München was a LASH carrier (Lighter Aboard Ship) — a specialised vessel designed to carry barges called "lighters" that could be loaded with cargo ashore and then hoisted aboard the mother ship for ocean transit. Built in 1972 by AG Weser in Bremen, she was one of the most modern and capable cargo ships in the Hapag-Lloyd fleet. At 261 metres long and over 38,000 gross tonnes, she was not a small ship.

LASH carriers were the cutting edge of cargo logistics in the 1970s. The concept was simple: load cargo into standardised barges at inland ports, tow them to the coast, and lift them aboard the ocean vessel with a massive 500-tonne gantry crane that ran the length of the deck. München could carry 83 lighters at a time, stacked in her hold and on deck.

She was classed by Germanischer Lloyd — one of the world's most respected maritime classification societies — and was considered a robust, seaworthy vessel. She had completed 61 uneventful voyages on the Bremerhaven–Savannah route before her 62nd.

The Final Voyage

On 7 December 1978, München departed Bremerhaven bound for Savannah, Georgia, with a crew of 28 under Captain Hans Kuhnke. She was carrying a full load of lighters. The weather forecast for the North Atlantic was poor — December crossings usually were — but nothing that a ship of her size and class should not handle comfortably.

The Search

The alert triggered one of the largest search and rescue operations in North Atlantic history. Over the following days, more than 110 aircraft and 80 ships combed an enormous area of ocean. The weather was appalling, with visibility often near zero and seas still running 10–15 metres.

They found almost nothing. A few scattered lighters. Some loose cargo. A single life ring. And one piece of wreckage that would puzzle investigators for decades.

No bodies were ever recovered. No wreck site was identified. MS München and her 28 crew simply ceased to exist somewhere in the mid-Atlantic.

The Theory

In 1978, the concept of a "rogue wave" was not taken seriously by the scientific establishment. The damage 20 metres above the waterline was inexplicable under prevailing wave models, which predicted maximum wave heights far below that in any realistic storm.

It was not until 1995, when the Draupner platform in the North Sea recorded a 25.6-metre rogue wave with scientific instruments, that the loss of München could be explained. A rogue wave of 25–30 metres could easily have struck the ship's superstructure at the 20-metre mark, tearing away the davit and mast. If such a wave struck the ship broadside, or if the bow plunged into a deep trough followed by an enormous crest, the München could have been overwhelmed so quickly that no distress call was possible.

The automated EPIRB signal — brief, intermittent, unaccompanied by any voice communication — suggests the ship sank within minutes, possibly seconds. The crew had no time to react.

Legacy

The loss of München was, in retrospect, one of the most important maritime disasters of the 20th century. Not because of the death toll — 28 crew, tragic but modest by maritime standards — but because the wreckage evidence was so anomalous, so impossible to explain by conventional theory, that it helped drive the scientific re-evaluation of extreme ocean waves that culminated in the Draupner measurement 17 years later.

She was a well-built, well-maintained, well-manned ship on a routine crossing. She shouldn't have sunk. The sea took her anyway.

Further Reading

• Wikipedia MS München — Wikipedia
• Article Remembering München and Winter in the North Atlantic — The Maritime Executive
• Related Draupner Wave — Wikipedia
• Related Rogue Wave — Wikipedia