Paul Watkins remembers the sheer sense of disbelief on the streets just after the Herald of Free Enterprise went down.

He was leader of Dover District Council when the Herald capsized off Zeebrugge on March 6, 1987, killing 193 people.

Watch to find out what happened to the Herald of Free Enterprise

He said: "There was just disbelief on the streets. People were coming together to try to get information at the early stages or just comfort each other. This was such a major blow to the community."

Mr Watkins first heard the news at his home in Deal when he was woken up in the early hours of March 7 by a telephone call from John Moir, the then council chief executive.

Mr Watkins said: "He told me the Herald had gone down and that he wanted to action the council's emergency plan. He needed formal clearance as I was the chairman of the council's emergency committee.

"From then on we had to co-ordinate action and put council staff throughout the entire district on notice.

"For one thing were had to prepare for any housing need for survivors but in the end that was taken care of at Zeebrugge."

But the council, in the immediate aftermath, did set up the Channel Ferry Disaster Fund to help survivors and victims' families.

Its committee was headed by Amelia Williamson who was Dover District Council chairman at the time.

Mr Watkins said: "The process of running a disaster fund was a large undertaking but I particularly pay tribute to members of the Rotary Club of Dover for their contribution.

"They were heavily involved in meeting relatives, friends and survivors and sensitively dealt with claims.

"The complication was that they did not just have to deal with local people but also people from all over the UK and abroad.

"From the disaster also came the Dover Counselling Centre and there were some great stalwarts dealing with friends, relatives and survivors from such a tragedy.

"Plainly this changed ferry safety completely. It was a landmark episode, which highlighted some of the practices that are now unacceptable."

This turned out to be one of two tragedies Mr Watkins had to deal with as a high-ranking councillor.

The second was the IRA's bombing of the Royal Marines School of Music near Deal on September 22, 1989 when 11 people were murdered.

Mr Watkins, then council chairman and the area's ward councillor for Lower Walmer, was at the scene that day, again with Mr Moir.

Peter Sherred, of the Rotary Club of Dover, first heard about the Herald sinking on the TV news at his home in the town.

He said: "I was as as shocked as everyone else at the news coming from Zeebrugge.

"I remember a significant number of the clergy congregated at P&O HQ in Channel View Road on the night of the disaster and of course they had much pastoral work to undertake."

Mr Sherred, now 74, was a solicitor in 1987 for Stilwell and Harby at Maison Dieu Road, Dover.

He was regularly seen at the magistrates courts in Dover and Deal Town Halls and Sandwich Guildhall representing defendants.

He says: "I was a member of the Rotary Club at the time and I seem to recall that John Turnpenny (Dover magistrate in 1987) became the lead name in the subsequent fundraising but he was not a Rotarian."

The Herald of Free Enterprise, owned by Townsend Thoresen, capsized at 6.28pm on Friday, March 6, 1987, as she left Zeebrugge Harbour in Belgium.

It had 459 passengers, 80 crew, and 131 vehicles, mostly cars and lorries.

Many of those on board were taking advantage of a special offer from The Sun newspaper of £1 day trip tickets.

The ship set sail for Dover at 6.05pm in calm weather. But it keeled over because the inner and outer bow doors had been left fully open, allowing seawater to rush in.

A public inquiry by the Department for Transport heard the assistant bosun, Mark Stanley, of Ashford, had fallen asleep in his cabin, waking in darkness and feeling the ship tilting over.

He and other crew members tried to save the lives of passengers, but others died in the process.

Chief officer Leslie Sabel, from Canterbury, failed to make sure the doors were closed, and the master, Captain David Lewry, from Sandwich, left the port without knowing whether the doors were closed.

The final death toll came to 193 people, consisting of 38 crew and 155 passengers. The ship was left on its side, half-submerged in shallow water.

The public inquiry opened that May and was led by Wreck Commissioner Mr Justice Sheen.

His report in July said: “The court finds that the capsizing of the Herald of Free Enterprise was partly caused or contributed to by serious negligence in the discharge of their duties by Captain Lewry, Mr Sabel and assistant bosun Mark Stanley and partly caused or contributed to by the fault of Townsend Car Ferries Limited.”

Mr Sheen said that the company had been “infected with a disease of sloppiness” and blamed all levels of personnel from directors to the junior superintendents.

The report grimly said: “Approximately 459 passengers had embarked for the voyage to Dover, which they expected to be completed without incident in the prevailing good weather.”

An inquest at Dover Town Hall ended on October 8, 1987, with a jury giving verdicts of unlawful killing for 187 of the victims. The jury found they had died from drowning and hypothermia.

An open verdict had been given on the 188th victim, a woman who had fractured her neck in the accident and died two months later after a blood clot in her lung.

It was not certain if death was the direct cause of the accident.

Not all the bodies had been recovered, explaining why there had not been inquests for all 193 victims.

One victim, a baby, was returned to Germany for burial and was not subject to the inquest. One more body, of a 57-year-old man, floated to the surface near the scene of the wreck on November 4.

A direct result of the disaster was a new era in ferry safety and technology that ensured captains could see if the bow doors were closed from the bridge.

The operating company, P&O European Ferries (Dover) Ltd, was brought to trial for corporate manslaughter in 1990 but the case collapsed. But it paved the way for the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007, which finally came into force in 2008.

Mr Stanley, of Quantock Drive, Ashford, died in hospital on July 20, 2016, aged 58.

Mr Justice Sheen’s report had said: “Mr Stanley has frankly recognised his failure to turn up for duty and he will, no doubt, suffer remorse for a long time to come.

“In fairness to Mr Stanley, after the Herald capsized he found his way out of the ship on to her hull where he set about rescuing passengers trapped inside.”

This year's annual memorial service is at St Mary the Virgin Church in Cannon Street, Dover, at 2pm today.

The Bishop of Dover, the Rt Reverend Rose Hudson-Wilkin, will attend.

The names of all 193 who perished will be read out.

At 4pm there will be a short Act of Remembrance on the seafront.

The event is again organised by the maritime welfare charity Sailors’ Society.

Sailors’ Society’s chief executive Sara Baade said: “For 35 years this tragedy has remained in the hearts of everyone affected, including our chaplains who comforted and supported the families and survivors.

“This memorial service gives us the chance to join with families in remembrance not only of the loved ones lost, but the many heroic acts of crew and passengers that night.”