Holland was a gunnery expert; he was well aware of the danger posed by "Hood"s thin deck armour, which offered weak protection against vertical plunging fire. Holland therefore wanted to reduce the range as quickly as possible, because at a shorter range the trajectory of "Bismarck"s shells would be flatter, and the shells would therefore be more likely to hit the armour belt protecting the sides of the ship or glance off the top deck, rather than penetrate vertically though the deck armour. Holland closed the range at an angle that placed the German ships too far forward of the beam, which meant that only 10 of the 18 British heavy guns could train and presented the Germans with a bigger target than necessary. One of "Prince of Wales" forward guns became unserviceable after the first salvo, leaving only 9 still firing. "Suffolk" and "Norfolk" tried to engage "Bismarck" during the action but both were out of range and had an insufficient speed advantage over "Bismarck" to rapidly close the range.