List of maritime disasters

Last updated September 29, 2024

The list of maritime disasters is a link page for maritime disasters by century.

Pre-18th century

Peacetime disasters

All ships are vulnerable to problems from weather conditions, faulty design or human error. Some of the disasters below occurred during periods of conflict, although their losses were unrelated to any military action. The table listings are in decreasing order of the magnitude of casualties.

Year	Country	Description	Deaths
1495	Denmark	Gribshunden – Flagship of John, King of Denmark caught fire and burned down while in the Baltic Sea off the coast of Ronneby in southeastern Sweden, becoming one of the best-preserved shipwrecks from the late medieval period. Exact number of deaths unknown, reported only as many of the crew of 150.	many of the crew of 150
1694	England	HMS Sussex – the third-rate ship was lost in a fierce storm on 1 March off Gibraltar. There were two survivors from a crew of 500.	498
1120	England	White Ship – Ship carrying William Adelin, heir to the English Throne and the Duchy of Normandy, and more than 300 others. Drunk crew ran it aground in the English Channel. There was one survivor, a butcher from Rouen, and the loss was followed by 20 years of civil war over the English crown.	300
1647	Dutch Republic	Princess Amelia – On 27 September, Captain Bol mistook the Bristol Channel for the English Channel and ran it aground off the Mumbles, Wales where it broke apart. Of 107 passengers aboard, 21 survived.	86
1682	England	HMS Gloucester (1654) - wrecked off the port of Yarmouth while carrying James, Duke of York (who survived.)	150
1468	Finland	Hanneke Vrome - a hulk transporting passengers and valuable cargo sank off Raseborg, Finland in a storm on November 20, 1468.	180

Wartime disasters

Disasters with great loss of life can occur in times of armed conflict. Shown below are some of the known events with major losses.

Year	Country	Description	Lives lost
256 BC 253 BC	Roman Republic	Sinking of the Roman fleet in the First Punic War – In the First Punic War, between the Roman Republic and Carthage, a Roman fleet that had just rescued a Roman army from Africa was caught in a Mediterranean storm.	90,000+
1274 1281	Mongol Empire	Kamikaze – The Mongol fleet destroyed by a typhoon.	100,000+
1588	Spain	Spanish Armada – On 8 August, Philip II of Spain sent the Armada to invade England. Spain lost 15,000–20,000 soldiers and sailors, mainly in storms rather than battle.^[1]	15,000–20,000
1589	England	English Armada – Also known as the Counter Armada or the Drake-Norris Expedition, was a fleet of warships sent to the Iberian Coast by Queen Elizabeth I of England in 1589, during the Anglo-Spanish War (1585–1604) and the Eighty Years' War. It was commanded by Sir Francis Drake as admiral and Sir John Norreys as general. The campaign resulted in the defeat of the English fleet and eventually to a withdrawal with great losses both in lives and ships.	11,000–15,000
1588	Spain	Girona – On 28 October, as part of the Spanish Armada, the Spanish galleass was sunk in a gale off Ireland. Of the estimated 1,300 people aboard, nine survived; 260 bodies were washed ashore.	1,291
1564	Sweden	Mars – A Swedish warship that was sunk 18 kilometres north of Öland during the Northern Seven Years' War. The crown ship of King Eric XIV of Sweden's fleet. The gunpowder store exploded and as many as 1,000 people, including Swedes and the invading Lübeckians, died.^[2]	900–1100
1692	France	Soleil Royal – On 3 June, in the Battle of La Hougue, the French flagship was attacked by 17 ships at Pointe du Hommet. The ship managed to repel them with artillery fire, but a fire ship set its stern afire and the fire soon reached its powder rooms. The people of Cherbourg came to the rescue, but there was only one survivor out of 883 to 950 crew.	882–949
1676	Sweden	Kronan – In the Battle of Öland, the warship capsized while turning. Gunpowder aboard ignited and exploded. Of the estimated 800 aboard, 42 survived.	758
1545	England	Mary Rose – The warship sank in the Battle of the Solent on 19 July. The cause is unknown, but believed to have been due to water entering its open gunports. About 500 people were lost.	480–520
1591	England	HMS Revenge – After being captured in battle, the English galleon was lost in a storm near the Azores. An estimated 200 Spanish sailors who captured it were lost.	200
1678	France	Las Aves disaster – on 11 May a French fleet commanded by Admiral Jean II d'Estrées was wrecked on the Las Aves archipelago in the Caribbean Sea due to an error in navigation. Nine of the fleets 30 ships were lost. Estimates of the lives lost vary wildly, from 24 to more than 1,500.	24–1,500

18th century

19th century

20th century

World War I

World War II

21st century

Related Research Articles

This is an index of lists of shipwrecks, sorted by different criteria.

MS Estonia was a cruiseferry built in 1980 for the Finnish shipping company Rederi Ab Sally by Meyer Werft, in Papenburg, West Germany. It was employed on ferry routes between Finland and Sweden by various companies until the end of January 1993, when it was sold to Nordström & Thulin for use on Estline's Tallinn–Stockholm route. The ship's sinking on 28 September 1994, in the Baltic Sea between Sweden, Finland and Estonia, was one of the worst peacetime maritime disasters of the 20th century, claiming 852 lives. An official inquiry found that failure of the locks on the bow visor caused water to flood the car deck and quickly capsize the ship. The report also noted a lack of crew action. A 2023 investigation noted additional construction flaws in the bow visor.

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MS Express Samina was a French-built RoPax ferry that struck the charted Portes Islets rocks in the Bay of Parikia off the coast of Paros island in the central Aegean Sea on 26 September 2000. The accident resulted in 81 deaths and the loss of the ship. The cause of the accident was crew negligence, for which several members were found criminally liable.

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SS Sardinia was a passenger-cargo ship which caught fire off Malta's Grand Harbour on 25 November 1908, resulting in at least 118 deaths. The ship was carrying Moroccan pilgrims on the way to Mecca. It is believed that a cooking fire on deck accidentally ignited nitrate in one of the ship's cargo holds, resulting in a number of explosions and causing the ship to run aground.

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References

↑ "Queen Elizabeth I – Against the Spanish Armada". SparkNotes.
↑ Mars (Swedish ship), "On 19 August 2011, it was announced that the shipwreck of Mars was discovered by the Ocean Discovery team!". Ocean Discovery.

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[1] "Queen Elizabeth I – Against the Spanish Armada". SparkNotes.

[2] Mars (Swedish ship), "On 19 August 2011, it was announced that the shipwreck of Mars was discovered by the Ocean Discovery team!". Ocean Discovery.

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