All language subtitles for Drain the Oceans S01E09 Ultimate Battleships 1080p Amazon WEB-DL DD+ 5.1 x264-TrollHD_track3_[eng]

NARRATOR: Under the seas
off Northern Europe.

A lost graveyard
of mega warships.

JURENS: They were the
H-Bombs of the era.

NARRATOR: In 1916 these
are among the most powerful
weapons ever built.

At the height of the Great War,
they stage an epic showdown.

DR. DELGADO: This is
a fight to the death.

NARRATOR: But with the
evidence lost deep beneath the
waves, the battle remains
shrouded in mystery.

Until Now.

Imagine if we could empty the
oceans, letting the water drain
away to reveal the secrets

of the sea floor.

Now we can.

Using the latest underwater
scanning technology...

piercing the deep oceans
and turning accurate
data into three D images.

The battle of Jutland is the
greatest naval action of World
War One

But which side actually wins?

After the war ends how
does a fleet of gigantic
battleships simply vanish?

And in world war two, what sink
one of the last great Jutland
warships

while it's anchored
in a safe harbour?

1916. Germany is at war with
Britain and her allies.

In the North Sea, two mighty
fleets are set to clash in the
biggest sea battle of World War
One

It will ultimately decide
who wins the Great War.

Yet astonishingly, both
sides claim victory.

DR. DELGADO: For such a
climactic battle Jutland is one
that is shrouded in mystery

as well as controversy.

NARRATOR: As the waters begin
to drain away do they reveal
who really wins the Battle of
Jutland?

Danish research vessel VINA is
hunting for the ships destroyed
in this titanic naval clash.

JELLICOE: So this might be the
beginning of a wreck field.

NARRATOR: The crew are using
high tech multi-beam sonar
scans to do what no-one else
has ever attempted.

Uncover the entire
Jutland Battlefield.

Solving the mystery of
the battle is a personal
quest for Nick Jellicoe.

He's the grandson of
Admiral Sir John Jellicoe, the
commander of the British Fleet.

Admiral Jellicoe's
mission is to destroy
the German Imperial Navy.

And help win World War One.

JELLICOE: The burden of command
that sat on my Grandfather's
shoulders that day was huge.

All their lives depended
on what he was going to do.

NARRATOR: Jellicoe commands the
most powerful fleet in history,
and it's facing its biggest
test.

PROF. GROVE: Jutland is the
ultimate clash of battleships
and battle cruisers.

Perhaps the sort of ultimate
warships ever built in terms
of their military sex appeal.

NARRATOR: Before the First Worl
War, Britain and Germany are
locked in a dangerous arms race

Spending billions on ever large
and more powerful battleships.

Each hopes to
intimidate the other.

But it only inflames the
tensions between them.

DR. DELGADO: Ultimately what
this naval arms race leads
to is war.

NARRATOR: There is only
one survivor from this age
of naval giants The USS Texas.

The length of this mega ship,
is equivalent to the height
of a fifty storey skyscraper.

JURENS: These ships were
the ultimate weapons.

When you had one of
these there was nothing
that was more powerful.

NARRATOR: Weighing in at twenty
seven thousand tonnes, the USS
Texas is a Dreadnought type

battleship like many of the
ships that fight at Jutland.

JURENS: The thing that makes
this so enormously impressive is
the technology that went in to
making it.

The complicated engines,
the hugely capable guns.

All of this in an enormous hull.

Much larger than any ship
that had been built before.

NARRATOR: These massive
fourteen inch guns are among
the biggest on the high seas.

JURENS: Texas had ten of them.

If you're within range
it will punch through
12 inches of armour.

NARRATOR: When war breaks out i
nineteen fourteen, at first
neither Britain nor Germany

dare risk losing their massivel
expensive fleets in a head to
head confrontation.

They finally clash in a titanic
battle at Jutland in 1916.

Using the data collected by the
Vina it's now possible to do
something that no historian

or archaeologist has been able
to attempt before. Drain away
the waters of the North Sea

to reveal the remains of
the greatest sea battle
of World War One.

As the seawater flows away, a
haunted world slowly emerges.

The smashed wrecks of the
Ultimate Battleships.

Broken twisted debris from not
one but dozens of warships.

Across a huge area, five
thousand square miles.

May 31st, 1916.

The German fleet sets
out on a secret mission.

Their plan is to locate, attack
and destroy a small part of the
British Grand Fleet.

PROF. GROVE: The British Grand
Fleet is vastly superior
to the German High Sea Fleet,

both numerically, and also
in terms of gun power.

NARRATOR: The Germans under
Admiral Scheer have less than
a hundred warships compared

to the Royal Navy's one
hundred and fifty.

PROF. GROVE: Scheer's
original plan was to
come out with his fleet,

run parallel to the Danish
coast, Jutland, and hopefully
come across some British ships

in the numbers that
he can deal with.

NARRATOR: By heading out,
the Germans are setting
a trap for the British.

Only then will they attack.

PROF. GROVE: All they can do is
hope to wear down the British
Grand Fleet in a series of

engagements, to a point where
perhaps the two sides might
be more even in numbers.

NARRATOR: The German's
have been preparing
their strategy in secret.

DR. DELGADO: For
the Germans this battle is
"der Tag" - it's 'The Day'.

NARRATOR: But the British
have a trap of their own.

They've cracked the secret
radio codes ordering
the Germans into action.

The Royal Navy mobilise
one hundred and fifty one
ships in two battle groups.

DR. DELGADO: For the British
this is an opportunity to crush
the Kaiser's fleet and win the
war at sea.

NARRATOR: The Germans don't kno
it yet but their ninety nine
ships are heading exactly

where the British want them.

It should be an easy
victory for the Royal Navy.

Around four thirty pm on May
31st, the two fleets sight each
other and the Germans open fire

Over the next twelve hours
Jutland becomes the biggest
sea battle of world war one.

But what exactly happens is
still shrouded in mystery.

Even on the day itself,
neither side knows the precise
movements of the other.

In the days before modern
satellite Navigation, no-one
knows their exact positions.

Both sides are running blind.

To send and receive orders, the
use flags, but that doesn't wor
when the visibility is poor.

JELLICOE: There are
thick fog banks.

There's funnel smoke all
over the battlefield.

There's even chemical smoke
screens being laid down.

NARRATOR: VINA is using the
sonar scans to pinpoint the
exact position of one

of the early casualties
of the battle the ironically
named HMS Invincible.

JELLICOE: Goodness
me what are these?

Could this be a gun?
MAN: Yeah you can see the gun.

JELLICOE: One of the barrels.
MAN: It's upside down.

NARRATOR: First they
locate two gun turrets.

But where is the
ship they come from?

JELLICOE: Look at this!
Look at this!

I think we've found
something here.

NARRATOR: It's now
possible to drain the
waters of the North Sea,

not only revealing the wreck of
invincible, but also evidence o
the explosive violence of its
final moments.

Over seventeen thousand
tons of high grade steel.

Armour plating six
inches thick has simply been
shattered by a huge explosion.

The hull of Invincible is
literally blasted in two.

Such is the explosive force tha
wrecks the ship that its gun
turrets lie almost four hundred
feet away.

The power of the blast
must have blown them
clean out of the ship.

JELLICOE: You know how
much these things weigh?

These are about
sort of 200 tons.

Can you imagine the violence and
the force of this explosion?
SURVEYOR: Amazing, isn't it?

JELLICOE: It's,
it's extraordinary.

NARRATOR: The hull is broken
at the spot where Invincible's
two central gun turrets

are connected to the
ammunition stores below.

What does this reveal about
how the ship explodes?

Like the USS Texas, Invincible
has fire proof blast doors

that stop fires spreading
preventing the entire
vessel from exploding.

So what goes wrong?

[explosions]

[music]

Draining the water of the North
Sea is uncovering secrets about
the Battle of Jutland.

And helping solve a
controversial question is it
the Germans or the British

who win the battle?

The drained wreck of
HMS Invincible reveals
extraordinary damage.

Can the shattered remains offer
clues about how the explosion
snaps the ship clean in half.

PROF. GROVE: This is a
tremendous shock and it
produces very heavy casualties.

A ship of this size going up is
going to kill a thousand people.

NARRATOR: There is one substanc
explosive enough to blow up a
warship a type of Gunpowder,

known as Cordite and
battleships like Invincible and
the USS TEXAS are packed with
tons of it.

It's what allows them to
fire their deadly payload.

JURENS: The whole purpose
of this enormous ship is
to take this projectile,

which weighs half as much as a
Toyota, and push it out ten or
fifteen miles to hit an enemy.

Some Husky Sailors would lift up
4 of these big propellant bags.

Inside was Cordite.

Central station fires the gun,
ignites the cordite, pushing
this shell out about four times

the speed that an
airliner flies.

About 25 seconds later and ten
miles away, this thing comes
down and we hope hits the enemy.

[explosion]

NARRATOR: But the danger for al
battleships is that if their ow
cordite store is ignited

by an enemy shell, the
entire vessel explodes.

So extraordinary safety feature
to keep fires from spreading ar
built into the design

of battleships like the
USS Texas.

Cordite is stored in magazines
deep inside the ship.

The metal blast doors seal
the magazines preventing fire
spreading down from the guns
above.

And the highly flammable bags
of cordite are passed up to the
guns through secure hatches.

So with all these elaborate
safety precautions in place wha
goes wrong on the Invincible?

VINA deploys a submersible
camera to search for evidence
around the turrets

JELLICOE: My gosh, look at
that, we're right underneath.

There's something here.

It does look more like
a shell doesn't it?

So just below the shell one
can see the top of a cordite
container and strands of

Cordite.

Because in these long stick like
strands all bundled together.

Quick burning, very unstable.

NARRATOR: The cordite
and shells piled together
in the wrecked turret,

expose a fatal vulnerability.

The Royal Navy is playing
with fire literally.

JURENS: They could be ignited
if something went wrong
inside the turret itself.

NARRATOR: The drained wreck,
shows the force of the blast
goes through the ship

from top to bottom.

There's only one
possible explanation.

The blast doors are left open.

This solves the mystery.

A German shell hits
the gun turret amidships
and ignites the cordite.

Fire spreads in seconds
through the open doors to the
main ammunition store below.

The result - Invincible is
torn in half, and the two
gun turrets blown sky high.

JURENS: The impact of a
hundred tons of cordite
going off is enormous.

It'll tear a ship in half,
it tore invincible in two.

NARRATOR: But why would
Invincible's crew risk leaving
the fire proof blast doors wide
open?

DR. DELGADO: In naval
warfare there are different
approaches to fighting.

For the British it's rapidity
of fire, it's getting as many
shells off as fast as you can.

PROF. GROVE: To increase
the rate of fire, magazine
doors are left open.

The propellants are piled up.

You hit anywhere in that
system, and you have a trail of
destruction going down

into the magazines.

Some magazine doors were
actually taken off.

This is suicidal.

NARRATOR: This tactical error
causes the Royal Navy to lose
four of its best ships in less
than three hours.

And the battle is yet
to reach its climax.

Emptying the North Sea reveals
the extent of the battlefield.

This extraordinary drained
landscape helps decipher
the course of the action.

DR. DELGADO: When you look at
the entire battlefield, if you
were to take all the water away

what you see is each warrior
where they fell.

The position in which
they lie, the type of
damage that they took.

In a larger forensic
sense, helps you re-create
the Battle of Jutland.

NARRATOR: About four hours into
the battle, the Germans still
believe they are facing a small

part of the British fleet.

Until the sea fog lifts.

PROF. GROVE: Suddenly Admiral
Scheer the German commander sees
the whole northern horizon

light up with the gunfire of
a long line of British
battleships.

This is his worst nightmare.

NARRATOR: Scheer is staring
down the awesome firepower of
the main British battle fleet.

With fifty more ships than his
enemy, Admiral Jellicoe has an
extraordinary opportunity.

JELLICOE: The British didn't
just want victory they wanted
total annihilation of the German
fleet.

PROF. GROVE: The classic
naval tactic is to cross
the enemy's T.

Have your fleet sail across
the front of the enemy fleet,
so that you concentrate

your firepower and the
enemy doesn't have as many
guns brought to bear.

JELLICOE: It's a moment of
potential annihilation.

This is the critical point
of the battle in many ways.

NARRATOR: By Crossing the
T, the British bring the full
force of their weapons to bear.

They open fire.

The German reaction
is astonishing.

They launch a daring escape
bid, under heavy fire, risking
collisions between their ships.

DR. DELGADO: As the British
cross the T, the Germans
execute an incredible feat

of seamanship they turn 180.

The British aren't even
expecting this and so the
Germans get out of the trap.

JELLICOE: One moment
Jellicoe has all the German
fleet in his sights.

Four minutes later nothing.

The Royal navy misses a golden
opportunity to destroy the
German fleet and change the
course of the war.

Draining the whole
Jutland battlefield
uncovers more wrecks,

revealing how the Germans
try to get away, and the
British try to catch them.

VINA heads south, hunting for
the remains of a warship that
reveals the lengths the Germans

are willing to go to
avoid capture

Lutzow.

PROF. GROVE: Lutzow
was the newest of the
German battle cruisers,

only just been commissioned
and she was a very fine ship.

She had 8 12 inch guns,
very heavily protected.

NARRATOR: The waters of the
North Sea drain away

and Lutzow appears for the firs
time in over a hundred years.

This reveals astonishing
new evidence of the
ship's extraordinary fate.

Lutzow lies face down.

There's damage to the hull but
unlike Invincible the ship
hasn't been blown in half.

So what sinks Lutzow?

Draining away the cold dark
waters of the North Sea, reveal
one of the most powerful German

warships at Jutland Lutzow.

DR. DELGADO: Luützow was heavily
mauled in the Battle, so much
so that it's almost

like target practice for the
Royal Navy.

NARRATOR: Lutzow is
heavily damaged, but the
wreck reveals a surprise.

The hull is not blown
into separate pieces.

JELLICOE: It actually looks
like quite a complete hull.

So not battle damage?
SURVEYOR: Not battle damage.

NARRATOR: Lutzow's intact hull
is evidence it doesn't blow up,
and Vina's cameras now suggest

a possible reason why.

The ship's highly explosive
cordite is stored in these
protective metal canisters.

JURENS: The German systems used
brass cartridge cases to carry
the propellant

from place to place so it
was enclosed and less likely
to ignite.

NARRATOR: The drained seabed
also shows the wreck lies
nowhere near where the British
fleet is operating.

Suggesting it isn't
sunk by the Royal Navy.

The wreck reveals extensive
damage below the waterline.

Evidence that Lutzow is struck
by weapons feared by all the
ultimate battle ships

Torpedoes.

Unleashed not by the Royal
Navy but by the Germans.

DR. DELGADO: Lutzow gets
away from the British
and Limping home,

the crew realizes that the
ship's not going to make it.

Rather than leave it afloat
for the British to capture
and make a trophy of,

they decide to sink it.

[explosion]

NARRATOR: Packed with advanced
military technology, it's vital
Lutzow doesn't fall into enemy
hands.

But that's not all.

DR. DELGADO: There's honour at
stake here and so they scuttle
it and they see nothing wrong
with that

in fact it's the type of action
that will get you a medal.

NARRATOR: But the pride that
drives the Germans to sink
one of their best ships,

comes at a terrible price.

JELLICOE: There were men
trapped in the dynamo room.

They had stayed on board to
keep the light running so that
their comrades could get off.

They were the ones who were
told they're not going to get
off, the ship is going to be

torpedoed by their
own torpedo boats.

They knew they were gonna die.

NARRATOR: Eight hours into
the battle night has fallen.

The battered German
fleet is running south to
its base at Wilhemshaven.

Draining the wrecks lying close
to Germany reveals what happens
when the British catch up to th
Germans.

Will they prevent their
escape, destroy their
fleet, and win the battle?

VINA is following the course th
British take as they pursue the
Germans south in the darkness.

Scans pick up another wreck.

It's a British armoured cruiser
a type of warship completely
outgunned by German battleships

JELLICOE: We can see the
propeller shaft here and some
extensive damage in the stern
section.

NARRATOR: VINA has found the
wreck of HMS Black Prince.

Draining away the sea
water reveals that the hull
is broken clean in two.

A gun turret lies exactly in th
position where the hull splits.

It's taken a direct hit and
the magazines have blown up.

From the drained wreck
we can start to piece
together what happens.

While looking to re-join the
main British fleet, Black Princ
runs into a formation of twelve

German battle ships and
in the darkness mistakes
them for the Royal Navy.

The wreck lies pointing to the
North East, confirming Black
Prince is trying desperately to
steer away from the Germans.

PROF. GROVE: We know from
the archaeology now that the
ship appears to have turned,

so they knew what
danger they were in.

They didn't, they didn't
just sail into it.

But they turned too
little, too late.

[explosions]

NARRATOR: All eight
hundred and fifty seven
men on board are lost.

Black Prince is not the
only ship the British lose
as they pursue the enemy.

At least four more
warships are sunk.

The German rear guard action
uses torpedo attacks to keep
Jellicoe's force at bay.

Knowing his fleet isn't
well equipped for night
fighting he disengages.

The following day the Germans
make it safely back to base.

The Royal Navy fails
to stop their escape,
after just twelve hours,

the battle of Jutland is over.

Ten thousand sailors are dead.

As dawn breaks over the North
Sea, bodies from each side,
start to wash up along the
Danish Coast.

Even though they have retreated
the Germans claim victory
because they have fewer losses.

The British have
lost fourteen ships.

Admiral Scheer's German
fleet, just eleven.

JAMES DELGADO: He has
inflicted incredible
losses on the Royal Navy,

he has sunk more British
tonnage and killed more British
sailors than he has lost,

so to his mind
and for the Kaiser and for
Germany this is a victory.

NARRATOR: But despite losing
more ships and men, Admiral
Jellicoe's fleet ultimately win

the battle because
they now have complete
command of the North Sea.

For the rest of the war, German
battleships never dare challeng
the full might of the Royal Nav
again.

PROF. GROVE: The crucial
strategic fact is that the
British Grand Fleet is acting

as the stopper in
the bottle, to stop German
surface ships getting out.

NARRATOR: Taking control of
the sea after this battle is
decisive in winning World War
One.

For two years after Jutland,
Britain blockades German ports.

Slowly starving the
country into submission.

In 1918 Britain and her
allies are victorious.

Germany is forced to
give up its navy without
another shot being fired.

But if the conflict is over, wh
does the entire German fleet no
lie on the bottom of the sea?

[music]

When World War One ends
on November the eleventh
nineteen eighteen,

the German high seas fleet is
anchored in its main base.

But a little over six months
later, it's on the sea bed
five hundred miles away here,

off the northern
tip of Scotland.

The Orkney Islands cluster
around a gigantic natural
harbour called Scapa Flow.

Using the latest data from
detailed underwater scanning,

it's possible to drain
away the waters here.

The sea pushes back to
expose narrow passages
between the islands.

This ancient submerged landscap
makes Scapa Flow one of the
largest natural deep water
harbours in the world.

The perfect place to
imprison a battle fleet.

Skipper John Thornton knows
these waters better than most.

THORNTON: Scapa's a very
special and unique place, in
that the waters are sheltered,

it's the reason why it was
used as a British naval
harbour.

Also its position geographically
is very strategic.

NARRATOR: November 1918 the
defeated German fleet is ordere
to set sail into captivity.

DR. DELGADO: The Germans
with flags flying steam out,
and come into Scapa Flow,

and there they're
to be interned.

NARRATOR: They are anchored at
Scapa while politicians from th
Victorious allies decide

how they'll divide up these
spoils of war worth billions.

PROF. GROVE: It must
have given the Germans
terrible feelings of,

of disgrace and humiliation
and a determination

not to allow these ships to
fall into the hands of Allies.

NARRATOR: The political
wrangling over which of the
allies will get which

of the German ships continues.

June 1919.

Nearly Seven months after their
capture, the seventy four Germa
ships remain at anchor

under Royal Navy Guard.

Their skeleton crews prisoners
on their own vessels.

THORNTON: They had to be fed
and supplied from Germany the
British refused to supply them
locally.

They're on the ships with no
entertainment, no heating.

So these poor people would
have had a grim time.

NARRATOR: Using the latest
sonar data, draining Scapa Flow
reveals the fate of the German
fleet.

As the water recedes, it
uncovers the wreck of one of
the most advanced ships in the
entire German navy.

Packing no fewer than
ten twelve inch guns.

Markgraf is brand new when
the war starts in 1914.

The drained wreck now reveals
huge chunks cut out of the hull
more recently by salvagers,

searching for
valuable scrap metals.

The ship capsizes
as it goes down.

There are no signs of battle
damage along the giant hull
So what sinks the Markgraf?

These portholes are
clearly visible close to
what was the waterline.

And they appear to be open.

From the Dive Boat
Karin, a team sets out
to investigate the wreck.

[music]

[music]

They want to find out if the
portholes were opened before
or after the ship sinks.

STEVENSON: It's
a huge ship, your only
impression is just scale.

Minute after minute just
slowly moving along it.

It just keeps going and keeps
going, she's a massive ship.

NARRATOR: Dan's picture clearly
shows an open porthole.

STEVENSON: Here's one
with the actual glass
portal still in place.

JELLICOE: But it's open
STEVENSON: It's wide open.

There was no way a diver could
have got on the inside to have
unbolted that porthole so

it had to have been sunk with
the with the port hole wide
open.

NARRATOR: It's a vital clue
revealing an amazing event.

DR. DELGADO: One of the
most incredible acts in
the history of any Navy.

NARRATOR: There are more
German Battleships lying on
the bottom of Scapa Flow.

These wrecks are undamaged
no sign of explosions, no
holes made by torpedoes.

It can only mean one thing.

DR. DELGADO: What the Germans do
under the noses of their captors
is to simultaneously scuttle

their fleet that is
send it to the bottom.

NARRATOR: Shocked witnesses
take pictures of the ships
actually sinking.

It's June twenty first, 1919.

The decision on how the
German fleet is to be divided
up is due to be announced.

Under secret orders from
Germany, Fleet commander
Von Reuter has been quietly

preparing this
moment for months.

PROF. GROVE: The Germans saw
scuttling the fleet as actually
a way at getting back at their
captors.

It was actually an
aggressive move.

The Germans had got their
revenge at last, three years
after the battle of Jutland.

NARRATOR: Sinking their entire
fleet, prevents the allies from
getting their hands on the
German ships.

[music]

But sinking seventy four
warships at the same time,
requires more than just
leaving portholes open.

How did they do it?

David Manley is a naval
architect with an unusual skill

His job is testing ships
by trying to sink them.

HMS Belfast is a
typical warship.

It has weak spots if
you know what to look for
and have the right tools.

MANLEY: We're well below the
waterline here, and this pipe
is one of the ways in which you

would very easily uh sink a ship
of this size and all you need is
just a sledgehammer like this.

Hit the pipe hard, give it a
good whack, split it apart.

The force of the water coming
out of here well I mean if,

if you were standing near it,
it would take your head off.

It would enough to
fill this compartment
in just a few minutes.

And then everybody is just
heading for the upper deck.

NARRATOR: With their ships
flooding, the German crews have
to evacuate from deep within th
hull.

MANLEY: The amount of
coordination, is just fantastic.

To do that under the eyes of
the British who are guarding
the fleet is a feat of amazing
skill, amazing ingenuity.

Right so it's taken
me a few minutes to get up
here from the engine room,

but at least I'm on the upper
deck, I'm safe and I can escape.

NARRATOR: But in Scapa Flow whe
the Germans reach the decks of
their sinking ships

they are far from safe.

This cemetery bears witness to
the tragic consequences when
British guards realize what is
happening.

JELLICOE: Here is the last
resting place of the nine or so
German sailors who were killed

during the scuttle.

Walter Schumann, was the
commander of the SMS Markgraf.

He was shot after
he had surrendered.

They were effectively
the last casualties of
the First World War.

NARRATOR: German sailors
make the supreme sacrifice.

Shot while surrendering
after preventing the
capture of their ships.

[music]

In 1919 Seventy four
German warships are
scuttled in Scapa Flow.

But draining the water reveals
only seven actual shipwrecks.

And ghostly imprints left behin
by the others, what happens to
the missing warships?

[music]

As a boy Ian Murray Taylor
lived on the shores of Scapa.

He's the last man alive
who went inside one of the
scuttled German warships.

TAYLOR: I went right down
through the ship, it was very
duh dirty and dusty

and the air was a bit whiffy
and you could look down on to
the seabed below.

NARRATOR: In 1924 Ian's
grandfather Thomas MacKenzie
starts recovering the sunken
wrecks.

His family films the
extraordinary work that brings
them back to surface

so the valuable steel can
be sold for scrap.

Divers seal holes in the hull.

Compressed air is pumped in
until the ship is buoyant like
filling a balloon with air.

Then the massive battle ships
explode back to the surface.

In this way, during the 1920s
and 30s all but seven of the
German wrecks are raised.

Their hulls are towed away
and broken into pieces.

There are willing buyers
for the salvaged metal.

Among them, Adolf Hitler. He's
building a powerful new navy.

Scrap metal from The German
fleet returns home to be melted
down and re-used for a new

and deadly purpose.

DR. DELGADO: What also happened
in the aftermath of Scapa Flow
is for the Germans in particular

a sense of a War that
really hadn't ended.

What followed was a grim
determination to come back
and fight that War again.

NARRATOR: 1939 The Nazis use th
steel from the sunken German
megaships to prepare

a new generation of weapons.

PROF. GROVE: There is something
of a full circle here.

The Germans are getting
their own back

NARRATOR: They've learned the
bitter lessons of Jutland.

This time they'll
use submarines, not
battleships to wage war.

PROF. EPKENHANS: The era
of the big battleships which
dominated the seas, was over.

NARRATOR: In Scapa Flow the
sinking of one ship marks the
dramatic end of this era.

Investigators scanning this
unique wreck for the British
Ministry of Defence reveal

a capsized hull resting on
its twisted superstructure.

But only by draining the water
away, is it possible to see
close up the evidence

of what sinks this
veteran of Jutland?

HMS Royal Oak.

One side appears
undamaged, but the other
displays gaping wounds.

What sends Royal Oak to the
bottom in this safe haven?

LAWRENCE: The level of impact
and the destruction, uh

it was just, just mind-bending
to see

NARRATOR: October 1939. One
month into World War Two.

The Nazis want revenge
on the British and are
hunting for targets.

PROF. EPKENHANS: It was of great
symbolic value to hit the Royal
Navy in its heart and Scapa Flow

was of course the heart
of the Royal Navy.

NARRATOR: Royal Oak
lies safely at anchor.

The crew, including over a
hundred and fifty young
saylors, under eighteen

suspect nothing.

The guns are trained
on the skies in case
of Nazi air raids...

But the real threat lies below.

At the time of Jutland, old
ships are deliberately sunk to
block Scapa's narrow entrances

and defend against
submarine attacks.

But now they're falling
apart and it's possible
to sneak past them.

PROF. GROVE: There
were now passages for
submarines to get through,

where a daring submarine
commander could actually
get into the Flow.

NARRATOR: October
14th 12:58 A.M.

U-Boat Ace Gunther Prien
stealthily navigates U47 throug
the poorly defended channels of
Scapa.

The men and boys aboard
Royal Oak have no idea of
the danger they are in.

Examining the drained wreck
reveals Prien's first torpedo
smashes clean through the bow.

LAWRENCE: They all thought that
it was an explosion in the paint
store or of the aviation

fuel store um and uh they,
they didn't realise they
were being attacked.

NARRATOR: The wreck now
reveals three more torpedo
strikes along the hull.

These are the deathblows,
smashing huge holes in
Royal Oak.

[explosions]

Fatally wounded
below the waterline.

Royal Oak begins to capsize.

For most there's no escape.
The ship sinks in minutes.

833 sailors are lost.

More than a 130 of
them are just boys.

PROF. EPKENHANS: It was
received with enormous
enthusiasm in Germany.

Hitler sent his aeroplane to
Kiel to pick up the crew and fly
to Berlin where people hailed

them and everybody was happy.

DR. DELGADO: So it's one of the
greatest ironies perhaps in
naval warfare that out of the

scuttling at Scapa Flow comes
the steel that helps re-arm
Germany and one of those ships,

one of these U-Boats,
sneaks in to Scapa Flow and
sinks a veteran of Jutland.

If that's not ironic
I don't know what is.

[music]

NARRATOR: The wrecks of
Jutland and Scapa Flow

bear silent witness to a
lost age of naval warfare.

[explosions]

But draining the Ultimate
Battleships reveals the world
changing impact of the day they
fought to the death

and the courage of the men and
boys who served aboard them.