During the night of 27th to 28th September 1994, the Swedish-Estonian ferry ESTONIA sank in the middle of the Baltic Sea. 852 people lost their lives, only 145 were saved. Until today this has remained the biggest shipping catastrophe in European waters since the end of World War II. JULIA REUTER, a journalist with a leading German television magazine in Berlin, is trying to get a scoop on military black market arms trafficking from Russia. Her investigations lead her to Tallinn in Estonia, where on the evening of September 27, 1994 she misses the ferry ESTONIA, by mere minutes. One of the vehicles on the ship is a truck loaded with high-tech weapons. ERIK WESTERMARK is a Swedish lawyer, who is coming from a sailing trip along the Estonian coast with his 10-year-old son. They were setting off for the return trip back home to Sweden, aboard the ESTONIA. But the ferry doesn't make her port of call. She sinks in the midst of the cold Baltic Sea. Erik Westermark is among the rescued. The fate of his son remains initially uncertain. While reporting about the tragic sinking Julia meets Erik in Stockholm in a hospital. Both notice soon that the hastily assembled governmental investigating commission is very concerned with hushing up the actual background facts of the sinking. Through information from an Ex Stasi and KGB Agent, they come to understand that there is a connection between the secret arms transports and the sinking of the passenger ferry. They also make the startling discover that the ship's second captain, has simply vanished after having been rescued. Since Erik Westermark last saw his son together with the captain, he investigates this with hope that his son may still be alive as well. As Julia and Erik persistently seek to get to the bottom of the whole story, they become embroiled in the intricate crossfire between secret services and militaries. Getting closer and closer to the truth, they follow a hot trail and end up becoming the hunted themselves. Finally they are able to track down LOU ALDRYN a high ranking Pentagon official and the main puppetmaster in the background. What had started as a somewhat "normal" search for the truth of the ESTONIA disaster ends up as a final confrontation between "David" and "Goliath".