The Vasa - the ship that never sailed

by Read Listen Learn

It was a warm August day in Stockholm, capital of Sweden, in 1628. Thousands of people stood to watch the start of the first voyage of a new ship. Most of these people were from Sweden, but there were also many foreigners with them. Some were there to look at the ship and tell their kings and princes about the new boat. The name of this very special ship was 'Vasa'.

The Swedish king, Gustavus Adolphus, was in Poland. He was with his army because he was fighting the terrible Thirty Years War and he was winning. It was a long time since Sweden was a strong country with a powerful army and the King wanted to change that. He now had many soldiers, but Sweden had no large ships that could really fight well. They had a few small boats but nothing that made people afraid. King Gustavus Adolphus wanted many large ships that showed people Sweden was an important country, a country that other kings should worry about.

'Vasa' was the first of Sweden's new ships. It was huge and had many guns. In fact, it had more guns than any other ship in Europe. But it was also beautiful. There were paintings all over it, for example. It was a ship for a king and the people were happy to think that 'Vasa' was Swedish. So, they were very excited when they saw the ship move into the water. Nobody knew people could build such wonderful ships. And 'Vasa' was theirs!

The ship moved about a thousand metres in the water. There was a sudden wind. It hit 'Vasa' for a second or two and the ship started to fall to one side. The wind stopped and 'Vasa' continued to move in the water. But then the wind came again and the ship fell to the left and started to sink. After only a few minutes, 'Vasa' was under the water. The most beautiful, the most dangerous ship in Europe was gone.

In 1961, about 330 years after 'Vasa' sank in Stockholm, the government lifted it out of the water. You can still see it today. It tells us an important story. If we know something is wrong with a plan, we need to speak. Vasa went underwater because nobody told King Gustavus Adolphus that the ship was too heavy. Many people knew this was true but nobody wanted to tell the King because they thought he was going to be angry!