"Mariella", the first of five ferries to reach the scene of the accident, arrived at 02:12. MRCC Turku failed to acknowledge the Mayday immediately and "Mariella"s report was relayed by Helsinki Radio as the less urgent pan-pan message. A full-scale emergency was only declared at 02:30. "Mariella" winched open liferafts into the sea onto which 13 people on "Estonia"s rafts successfully transferred, and reported the location of other rafts to Swedish and Finnish rescue helicopters, the first of which arrived at 03:05. The former took survivors to shore, while the latter—Finnish border guard helicopters Super Puma "OH-HVG" and Agusta Bell 412 "OH-HVD"—chose the riskier option of landing on the ferries. The pilot of "OH-HVG" stated that landing on the ferries was the most difficult part of the whole rescue operation; despite that, this single helicopter rescued 44 people, more than all the ferries. MS "Isabella" saved 16 survivors with its rescue slide.