Despite all that’s known about the Lusitania, it has been hard for historians to actually pin down exactly what happened when the ship sank. After all, the torpedo struck the side of the Lusitania and caused an explosion, but after a handful of moments passed, a second explosion also tore through the ship.
But the reason for that explosion — and the extent of the damage it caused — is one that no one fully agreed on. Some would argue that it was the first explosion, the initial blast caused by the torpedo, that doomed the ship. Other reports gave a bit more claim to the second explosion, citing it as being the larger of the two, at times accompanied by the explanation that it was caused by an erupting boiler.
There’s another school of thought, however. At the time, it was already known that the British Admiralty was disguising warships as mercantile vessels, and speculation eventually arose that the Lusitania was carrying more than civilian passengers; it might have been carrying ammunition and war supplies. And there appears to be truth in that. Searches of the wreckage, as well as secret documents, have since uncovered millions of rounds of ammunition, presumably being shipped from the U.S. for use in the war. Given the fact that war supplies were, in fact, on board the Lusitania, it only followed that some would speculate the second explosion as having originated from this secret stash of weapons.
[Featured image by Mary Evans Picture Library via Wikimedia Commons | Cropped and scaled | CC BY-SA 3.0]
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