Tauri Roosipuu, senior investigator of maritime accidents at the Safety Investigation Bureau (OJK), was responding to recent reports in the German media that Russia may be using the wreck of the Estonia, which sank in 1994, to install intelligence devices for tracking Baltic Sea shipping movements.

Roosipuu noted that the OJK carried out six dives to the wreck 2021-2024, which lies in over 100 meters of water off the Turku archipelago, detecting no suspicious devices during any of those dives. The wreck was the subject of investigations into what caused the sinking.

"We didn't use divers but different research instruments — sonar and underwater robots with cameras — and it is the case that nothing like that which the German media report has outlined was detected," Roosipuu said.

At the same time, he noted that finding small devices would be particularly difficult.

Visually finding any devices underwater is extremely difficult because visibility is poor — visibility extends only about five meters for an underwater robot camera, while sonar does not provide a detailed picture. "Usually, the process works like this: Sonar identifies potentially interesting objects, and these are then visually inspected with a camera to verify what they actually are," he explained.

Hiding a device underwater would generally be quite easy, since performing regular seabed inspections would be unimaginably labor-intensive, he added.
At the same time, for the Russians to do so would be irrational for several reasons, the expert said.

First, the chances of a device being found are much higher than they would be elsewhere. Due to the wreck's protected status, Finnish authorities monitor the site daily, and in addition to the research dives in recent years, private divers also visit the site. "It would be much simpler to find some random spot in the sea to place such devices without drawing attention," Roosipuu continued.

There would be less for any Russian espionage device to monitor at the site, compared with other, busier locations to the south, he went on. "The main traffic corridor for ships coming from the southern Baltic into the Gulf of Finland lies much closer to Hiiumaa. The Estonia wreck is not near the main shipping route, and the traffic density around it is relatively thin compared with that corridor."

"It wouldn't be very effective to collect any data from there, because ship traffic is so light that it wouldn't yield meaningful results," Roosipuu added.

Devices would also have to be visited regularly, for technical and maintenance reasons – both to retrieve data collected and to recharge or replace the batteries charging the device. Both of these actions would attract attention, he noted.

The Ministry of Defense also told ERR Estonian authorities said they have no information confirming the claims about the Estonia which have been circulating in German media.

"Various agencies of the Estonian state, together with allies, are closely monitoring developments in the Baltic Sea. This particular area of the Baltic Sea is one of the most closely observed locations, mainly because of the resting-place status of the wreck. Diving and stopping in the area are prohibited, and the location lies within Finland's jurisdiction," the ministry stated.

The Ministry of Defense added that in January 2025, NATO boosted its military presence on the Baltic Sea with the Baltic Sentry mission.

Former foreign intel chief: Typical rumor

Former head of the Estonian Foreign Intelligence Service (Välisluureamet) Mikk Marran, told ERR that, in his view, the story is a typical intelligence-related rumor, and so is difficult to prove or disprove.

"It comes as no great secret that intelligence services are always looking for new ways to gather information. Ethical values don't necessarily act as a restraining factor here. The wreck certainly occupies a strategic location [between NATO member states Estonia, Finland, and Sweden] but the question remains — why this particular wreck?" Marran, now chief of the State Forest Management Center, said.

ERR's science portal Novaator has previously reported the number of wrecks lying on the Baltic seabed stretches into the hundreds.

German media reported late last week, citing NATO sources, that Russia may have used the wreck of the sunken ferry MS Estonia in the Baltic for training and possibly intelligence purposes.

The MS Estonia sank in heavy seas on September 28, 1994, with the loss of 852 lives, making it one of the biggest peacetime maritime disasters in history.

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