"Rodney" spotted "Bismarck" at 08:44 on 27 May, one minute after "King George V", and was the first to open fire at a range of three minutes later with "Bismarck" replying at 08:49. The initial salvos from both ships were off, but "Rodney" straddled her opponent with her third salvo and hit her twice with her fourth at 09:02, knocking out the forward superfiring turret, disabling the lower turret and severely damaging her bridge. In her turn, "Bismarck" scored no hits, although she managed to damage "Rodney" with shell splinters before her forward guns were knocked out. As the British ship manoeuvred to bring 'X' turret to bear while closing the distance, she exposed herself to fire from "Bismarck"s aft turrets, which only managed to straddle "Rodney". As the range diminished, she began to fire torpedoes, although shock waves from near misses caused the door for her starboard tube to jam at 09:23. At 09:31, the ship blew off the left barrel of the "Bismarck"s lower aft gun turret and started a fire inside the turret that forced its evacuation. Around this time the combined fire from "Rodney", "King George V" and the heavy cruisers and knocked out all of "Bismarck"s main guns. "Rodney" closed to point-blank range and continued to engage, starting to fire full broadsides into "Bismarck" on a virtually flat trajectory, and added three more torpedoes at a range of beginning at 09:51; one of these malfunctioned, but another may have struck "Bismarck". According to the naval historian Ludovic Kennedy, who was actually present at the battle in "Tartar", "if true, is the only instance in history of one battleship torpedoing another."