Vasa Museum

I went to the Vasa Museum a few weeks ago.  The VASA was a Swedish warship that was built in the 1600's. The first of its kind.  Like the Titanic it sank on its maiden voyage.  However it did not hit an iceberg.  It capsized on the Stockholm harbour 20 minutes into its journey.  Since it was the first of its kind, the engineering was off and the boat had a high centre of gravity and the gun ports were too close to the water.  When a gust of wind tilted the boat it filled with water through the cannon port wholes.  Ship build after the Vasa were a metre wider and had more rocks in the hull to correct the problem.  There were many survivors since they swam to shore or got help from other boats out to see the big launch.  Only those trapped in the lower levels perished.

In the 1960's a company pulled the ship and its artifacts out of the habour.  Over the next severl years if was restored to it's previous glory, and the Museum was made to house it. It now sits, rebuilt and preserved in a museum in Stockholm.  It is amazing that it survived over 300 years underwater with limited damage.  The Vasa Museum is the number one most popular marine museum in the world.

Here are some pictures:

 This one is a model that was made to look  as it did on the maiden voyage 

  Life Boat

Ship's bell

 The masts were taller on the original ship but are designed to fit the building in the rebuild

 This is what the lower decks would have looked like.

Lions on the frount to make it look more frightening.

It was an absolutely amazing exhibit and I highly recommend it to anyone visiting Stockholm.