Force Ten (song) worked with Rush on their song "Tom Sawyer", had sent Neil Peart some lyrics for the song, and Peart would add more verses to it. Lyrically, the song describes the "storms of life," making a reference to a very high level of the Beaufort scale ("force ten" is defined as a 'storm', being near the scale's maximum of 12) as an analogy, according to the book "Rush and Philosophy: Heart and Mind United". Musically, "Force Ten" is composed in A minor, with changes into A major scale occurring in the song. The song is set in common time at a
MS Estonia starboard because of poor cargo distribution. According to the final disaster report, the weather was rough, with a wind of , force 7–8 on the Beaufort scale and a significant wave height of compared with the highest measured significant wave height in the Baltic Sea of . Esa Mäkelä, the captain of "Silja Europa" who was appointed on-scene commander for the subsequent rescue effort, described the weather as "normally bad", or like a typical autumn storm in the Baltic Sea. All scheduled passenger ferries were at sea. The official report says that while the exact speed at the time of