Hood continued on course until 17:40, when gunfire was spotted in the direction to which his light cruiser had been dispatched to investigate other gunfire flashes. "Chester" encountered four light cruisers of Hipper's 2nd Scouting Group and was badly damaged before Hood turned to investigate and was able to drive the German cruisers away. At 17:53, "Invincible" opened fire on ; the other two "Invincible"s followed two minutes later. The German ships turned for the south after fruitlessly firing torpedoes at 18:00 and attempted to find shelter in the mist. As they turned, "Invincible" hit "Wiesbaden" in the engine room and knocked out her engines while "Inflexible" hit once. The 2nd Scouting Group was escorted by the light cruiser and 31 destroyers of the 2nd and 9th Flotillas and the 12th Half-Flotilla which attacked the 3rd BCS in succession. They were driven off by Hood's remaining light cruiser and the five destroyers of his escort. In a confused action, the Germans only launched 12 torpedoes and disabled the destroyer with gunfire. Having turned due west to close on Beatty's ships, the "Invincible"s were broadside to the oncoming torpedoes, but "Invincible" turned north, while "Inflexible" and "Indomitable" turned south to present their narrowest profile to the torpedoes. All the torpedoes missed, although one passed underneath "Inflexible" without detonating. As "Invincible" turned north, her helm jammed and she had to come to a stop to fix the problem, but this was quickly done and the squadron reformed heading west.