MV Andaman (1953)

The MV Andaman was a Swedish motor cargo vessel built in 1947 by A/B Götaverken of Gothenburg for A/B Svenska Ostasiatiska Kompaniet, the Swedish East Asiatic Company. She was a modern post-war cargo ship of about 4,765 tons, measuring roughly 134 metres long, with a beam of about 17.8 metres, powered by oil engines. On her final voyage she was bound from Gothenburg to Calcutta, a long-haul trade route cut short in the thick fog of the Dover Strait, because the Channel has always treated visibility as an optional extra.

On 24 May 1953, Andaman collided with the Panamanian steamer Fortune about 3 miles south of the South Goodwin Lightvessel. She began sinking, and her 38 crew abandoned ship into two boats. The Dover lifeboat launched, but the crew had already been picked up by the SS Arthur Wright, before being transferred to the lifeboat and landed at Dover. No lives were lost. For divers, Andaman is a fine post-war Channel wreck: a substantial Swedish cargo ship, lost in fog near the Goodwins, with a clean rescue story and enough size, structure and atmosphere to make her far more than a name on a chart.