Question. There seem to be 2 competing theories floating around about how this happened. The first is that a power outage was engineered in order to cause loss of control. Speculate. Under normal circumstances with an alert crew, could a loss of power under specific conditions be guaranteed to cause an accident like we saw? Would only average winds be enough to cause the problem? Is this something that requires a very specific set of environmental circumstances, or would almost any power outage from a ship this size in the Suez result in the events we saw?

The second theory is that it was deliberate action by the crew. The dick-pic seems to confirm that if this was the case, then at least one person on the crew was likely involved. Whether or not the canal pilot was a part of the conspiracy is unknown. It seems possible that a determined crewman could have chosen a time when the canal pilot was indisposed to execute his maneuver. Again, speculate. What is the minimum complement of crew that would need to be incentivized in order to guarantee success of a mission such as the above? And it is realistic to assume this was done without the assistance of the canal pilot?

Assume now you are an intelligence organization that wants to make this happen, and you know you have only one shot with this specific vessel. Which of the above 2 scenarios is more likely to yield success and would be easier to effect? Your most important consideration is that you do not want this mission to fail.

Assuming we ignore the possibility that this was really all just an accident and random chance, is there a 3rd mechanism we have failed to consider here?