TV: No-show leaves that sinking feeling

As you'd expect, it was former Prime Minister David Lange who furnished the most memorable epitaph.

Shortly after the Mikhail Lermontov, the pride of the Soviet cruising fleet, ended her life at the bottom of the Marlborough Sounds, Lange declared that little old New Zealand was "the only nation to sink a Russian Ship since the Second World War."

It was, rather unfortunately, true. And 14 years later, this singular fact remains indisputable. The 20,000-tonne passenger liner, price tag $100 million, had been under the direct command of a New Zealander, Picton pilot Captain Donald Jamison, when a rocky underwater outcrop ripped gashes 25m long and half a metre wide in her side.

Only one person, a Russian engineer, died as a result of Jamison's flawed decision-making; good luck and good weather prevented more deaths.

But as tonight's first Documentary New Zealand for the year, Destination Disaster: The Sinking of the Mikhail Lermontov (8.30, TV One), explains, quite why Jamison blundered into the history books is not much clearer now that it was in February 1986.

Mostly the facts of the disaster are known. The Lermontov, an elegant 15-year-old liner owned and operated by the Baltic Shipping Company in Russia, was working Pacific waters during the Northern Hemisphere winter when she arrived in New Zealand from Sydney during what was billed as an "11-day cruise of a lifetime."

After visiting Auckland, Tauranga and Wellington, she and her 738 passengers and crew cruised to Picton for a brief stop before exploring the Sounds and returning to Australia.

It was while docked at Picton that Jamison boarded the Lermontov. He was to pilot her in the short sight-seeing cruise around his home waters - he worked them for 16 years - before he and his wife retired to their cabin on the Lermontov to enjoy a short holiday as the ship steamed back to Sydney.

He never got to enjoy his reputedly plush berth. Within a few hours of departing Picton, and after three close calls which took the ship perilously close to the shoreline, Jamison made the fatal decision to take the Lermontov through a passage which had never been used by ships of her size.

What was said and done on the bridge during the crucial last minutes remains clouded. Although this exhaustively researched programme speaks to nearly all the key Russian players, including her master (who, as the regulations demanded, had given Jamison command of his ship) and her helmsman, we never hear from the only person who really knows what went wrong.

Ultimately the real mystery lies in the mind of Jamison. What made him do it? Was he drunk (as some suggested), confused or over ambitious?

While many of the players offer their theories, this two-hour documentary, though it struggles valiantly to dig out the truth, is hamstrung by Jamison's absence.

But there's no real surprise that he failed to show. The former pilot and harbour master, now the master of a small inter-island freighter, has refused comment on the disaster since the short, sharp inquiry in 1986. The only excuse he's ever offered was that he was exhausted. Oddly this was accepted despite the evidence and he was never punished (although the Russians imprisoned one of their own).

This is, nonetheless, an unsinkable story and Destination Disaster, which includes interviews from all quarters including passengers, crew, rescuers, politicians, police and the lawyers who sued the Baltic Shipping Company, explores this tragedy with devotion and vigour.

One hopes Jamison will be watching.