Now meet the experts

Rob White reports

Bill Jurens and Dr Eric Grove have been hard at it today, drawing together their conclusions about what they saw as we filmed the wreck of 'Bismarck'. That's well over 16 hours of information to be assimilated - all of it new data, never before seen in such detail or so close-up.

Fortunately both of them have knowledge and skills in depth to rely on...

Bill Jurens

BILL is from Winnipeg in Canada. He's a teacher by profession - technical drafting is his speciality. Ideal for his current task, but he's been keenly interested in warship design and construction since he was a boy.

An Editor for 'Warship International', and a senior member of the United States Naval Institute, he's also a specialist in Marine Forensics - using scientific method to understand ship losses of every kind, but especially those of warships sunk in battle.

Added to those forensic skills is an expertise in big gun ballistics and aerodynamics, which enables him to analyze the dozens of heavy shell hits we witnessed on the wreck of 'Bismarck'.

Eric Grove

ERIC is increasingly in demand for TV warship documentaries in Britain and around the world. He appeared in Discovery/ITN Factual's 'The Mighty Hood', and also in Channel 4's major series 'The Battleships'.

His 'day job' is wider than that, however - as a defence analyst, lecturer and academic, specializing in modern naval history. As a lecturer at Dartmouth and Greenwich Royal Naval Colleges, he became used to challenging conventional opinion with new ideas.

Presently he's director of the Centre for Security Studies at the University of Hull. His books include 'Great Battles in Close-Up' and 'The Price of Disobedience' - a new examination of the battle of the River Plate.

It's going to be interesting indeed to hear what Bill and Eric have to say about both 'Bismarck' and 'Hood'!