U.S. investigators say South Korea evidence points to torpedo attack

How was the Cheonan sunk? U.S. Naval officials who participated in the international investigation point to the destruction of the HMAS Torrens, a 30-year-old decommissioned vessel that the Australian military used in 1999 in a weapons test of a Mark 48-Mod 4 torpedo. Video footage of the torpedo strike is widely available on the Internet.

“It is illustrative of the forces out there,” said Rear Admiral Thomas J. Eccles, who is chief engineer and deputy commander for naval systems engineering, and headed the U.S. team that investigated the Cheonan. Eccles says that when a modern torpedo explodes, it creates a bubble that will lift the ship, forcing it to crash back down. South Korean marines who were on nearby Baengnyeong island at the time of the March 26 explosion told investigators they heard two bangs about one second apart, according to Eccles. He says the “double tap” is the signature of this type of torpedo. “If you watch it you will hear the double tap,” said Eccles. “The ship will jump up… and then is punched back down.”

In South Korea, critics of the investigation into the Cheonan are also pointing to the video to bolster their case, saying the destruction of the Torrens was much more complete.

The video footage of 1999 sinking of the Torrens is popular on YouTube and has been widely used in film and propaganda. A digitally edited version of the clip was used to simulate black-and-white “newsreel footage” in the 2001 film Pearl Harbor. The Islamic militant group Hezbollah also reportedly used a photograph of the Torrens in 2006, claiming that it had sunk an Israeli warship.