esulted in disability to stop
the engines, with the result that the ship kept her headway until she
sank. That the ship commenced to list to starboard immediately is
abundantly established by many witnesses.

[Sidenote: The ship's behavior in going down.]

Some of the witnesses, (Lauriat and Adams, passengers; Duncan, Bestic,
and Johnson, officers,) testified that the ship stopped listing to
starboard and started to recover and then listed again to starboard
until she went over.

This action, which is quite likely, must have resulted from the inrush
of water on the port side. There can be no other adequate explanation
consistent with elementary scientific knowledge; for, if the ship
temporarily righted herself, it must have been because the weight of
water on the two sides was equal or nearly so. The entry of water into
the port side must, of course, have been due to some rupture on that
side. Such a result was entirely possible, and, indeed, probable.

The explosive force was sufficiently powerful to blow debris far above
the radio wires--i. e., more than 160 feet above the water. The boiler
rooms were not over sixty feet wide, and so strong a force could readily
have weakened the longitudinal bulkheads on the port side in addition to
such injury as flying metal may have done. It is easy to understand,
therefore, how the whole pressure of the water rushing in from the
starboard side against the weakened longitudinal bulkheads on the port
side would cause them to give way and thus open up some apertures on the
port side for the entry of water. Later, when the water continued to
rush in on the starboard side, the list to starboard naturally again
occurred, increased and continued to the end. As might be expected, the
degree of list to starboard is variously described, but there is no
doubt that it was steep and substantial.

[Sidenote: Ports had all been ordered closed.]

A considerable amount of testimony was taken upon the contention of
claimants that many of the ship's ports were open, thus reducing her
buoyancy and substantially hastening her sinking. There is no doubt that
on May 6 adequate orders were given to close all ports. The testimony is
conclusive that the ports on Deck F (the majority of which were dummy
ports) were closed. Very few, if any, ports on E deck were open, and, if
so, they were starboard ports in a small section of the first class in
the vicinity where one of the torpedoes did its damage.