The Wreck of DKM Bismarck − A Marine Forensics Analysis 1 The ...

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The Wreck of DKM Bismarck − A Marine Forensics Analysis The wreck of Bismarck crashed into a seamount, sliding hundreds of meters down its side before coming to rest. Note the alignment of the turrets with the wreck of the Admiral’s bridge. 44
The Wreck of DKM Bismarck − A Marine Forensics Analysis superstructure and the four main battery turrets, began its slide downhill, with its line of travel roughly aligned to its longitudinal axis. There is much evidence that the bow end hit at the top of the seamount and then the remainder of the hull slammed down over the remaining length with a great amount of force before beginning its slide. Evidence around Turret Bruno supports a bow-first impact.The area adjacent to the slide scar contains most of the large components of the ship that fell away during the capsizing process, such as the main battery turrets, the forward command tower, and the mainmast. A field of lighter debris lies to the west and southwest of the heavier pieces, carried to those locations by the prevailing current at the time of sinking because they took more time to fall to the seabed. Jim Cameron’s only regret is that there was not time to properly survey the impact crater. The only instance of bottom/side plate debris left in the slide scar was found near the impact crater a few meters to the south. The section of hull left there is approximately 25 meters long and relatively intact. However it is bent very cleanly on its longitudinal axis almost 90 degrees from the compressive forces which was accompanied by the hydraulic outburst. The survey of this piece seems to indicate that it was shaped by evenly applied forces from compressive and hydraulic loading and not torn away by the sliding hull. It was simply shed by the hull as it began its journey down the seamount. The concentration of the debris field is consistent with the situation of the Bismarck during her battle during the morning of 27 May − the ship had little or no forward movement while struggling in heavy seas without rudders. The avalanche/turbidity flow was induced by the impact and slide of the ship, and also by the continued downflow of the entrained water flow-field above the ship as it sank though the water column. When this volume of moving water reached the slope of the seamount much of its energy was dispersed down slope, maintaining its momentum. Add to the flow-field created by the wreck itself sliding down the side of the seamount, this combined to increase the flow effect downhill. This flow field would have picked many tons of sediment in the form of suspended particles and small rubble. This suspended material produced a turbidity flow condition, a heavy layer of water and sediment moving downhill much like the pyroclastic cloud of a volcanic eruption. The flow-field followed the fall-line of the slope, driven by gravity. The flow and the ship were moving together at times, and independently at times. The ship was descending in a path induced by the interaction of the hull with the terrain. It began sliding stern first South /South East with its long axis downhill, then rotated until it was sliding broadside down the hill, and eventually moved laterally to the West like a skier across the grade, coming to rest with the forward third of the ship outside the flow effects of the avalanche, in undisturbed terrain. In the ship’s last seconds of movement, the flow around the stern rotated the ship an additional 30 degrees, swinging the stern downhill after the bow came to rest outside the flow. In a complex interaction between ship and flow, the movement of the ship in the water column and on the seafloor induced the flow, but subsequently the flow’s momentum contributed to the movement of the ship over the ground. Ultimately the ship came to rest and the flow continued around its stern and on downhill for an additional half kilometer. Turret Anton is inverted and relatively intact just within the east margin of the slide scar, lying on top of the sediments, though its guns and gunhouse are largely buried. Its rotating structure was torn away and could not be found. The turret lies just downhill from a large rock outcropping, and the turret has a piece of red painted lower hull embedded into the uphill side of 45
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