The Battleship that Suddenly Exploded

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Liberté was a pre-dreadnought battleship built for the French Navy in the mid-1900s. She was the lead ship of the Liberté class, which included three other vessels and was a derivative of the preceding République class, with the primary difference being the inclusion of a heavier secondary battery. Liberté carried a main battery of four 305-millimeter (12 in) guns, like the République, but mounted ten 194 mm (7.6 in) guns for her secondary armament in place of the 164 mm (6.5 in) guns of the earlier vessels. Like many late pre-dreadnought designs, Liberté was completed after the revolutionary British battleship HMS Dreadnought had entered service, rendering her obsolescent.
On entering service, Liberté was assigned to the 2nd Division of the Mediterranean Squadron, based in Toulon. She immediately began the normal peacetime training routine of squadron and fleet maneuvers and cruises to various ports in the Mediterranean. She also participated in several naval reviews for a number of French and foreign dignitaries. In September 1909, the ships of the 2nd Division crossed the Atlantic to the United States to represent France at the Hudson-Fulton Celebration.
Liberté's active career was cut short on 25 September 1911 when a fire broke out in one of the ship's propellant magazines and led to a detonation of the charges stored there, destroying the ship in a tremendous explosion that killed 286 of her crew. The blast also damaged several other vessels and killed crewmen on six neighboring ships. An investigation revealed that the standard French propellant, Poudre B, was prone to decomposition that rendered it very unstable; it had likely been the culprit in several other ammunition fires in other ships. The wreck remained in Toulon until 1925, when her destroyed hull was refloated, towed into a drydock, and broken up.
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