Vasa Sinks on Its Maiden Voyage

August 10, 1628

The Swedish warship Vasa, overdecorated and top-heavy with two gun decks, heeled over in a light breeze twenty minutes after leaving the dockyard in Stockholm Harbor and sank in full view of the crowd. Gustavus Adolphus lost his flagship; three centuries later, divers raised it almost intact from the Baltic mud.