The sinking of the Salam 98 with 1,415 people on board comes almost exactly 60 years after the worst shipping disaster of the last century, in the final months of the Second World War.

The Wilhelm Gustloff, was built as a German low-cost cruise liner but was drafted in as a hospital ship during the war. It was carrying 10,600 wounded civilians and soldiers when it was torpedoed by a Russian submarine on January 30, 1945, 20 miles off the Polish port of Gdansk. There were fewer than 1,000 survivors - a casualty toll of more than 9,600.

The worst peacetime maritime tragedy occured more than 40 years later in the Phillippines when ferry the Dona Paz sank after colliding with tanker the Vector in the Sibuyan Sea in 1987. A total of 4,375 passengers on the liner and 11 crew members from the tanker were killed.

Although the number of fatalities pales in comparison, by far the most famous sea tragedy is the sinking in 1912 of steamship RM Titanic on her maiden voyage from Southampton to New York. Despite the most advanced technology, the 'unsinkable' vessel sank after colliding with an iceberg, killing at least 1,496 people.

Britain's worst post-war disaster at sea occured in 1987 with the sinking of Townsend Thoreson's Herald of Free Enterprise, which capsized 100 yards off the Belgian Port of Zeebrugge en route to Dover. The bow door of the roll-on, roll-off ferry had not been closed properly and as she reached 18 knots, water poured into the car deck. Of the 539 on board, 193 people died.

Although the tragedy led to the introduction of a host of new safety measures, Europe witnessed its worst maritime tragedy seven years later in 1994.

The Estonia was carrying 989 passengers and crew from Tallinn, Estonia, to Stockholm, Sweden, when fierce 15ft waves smashed open her bow doors. Again, water rushed into the car deck and the vessel lurched into the sea. Only 137 were saved.

The shipping lanes of the Red Sea have previously been visited by tragedy. In December 1991, 464 people were killed when the Salem Express hit coral outside the Red Sea port of Safaga, the Egyptian port which the Salam 98 was also destined never to reach.

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