The _Huascar_ very nearly blew herself up instead of her antagonist, the _Abtao_, off Antofagasta. She fired a Lay torpedo at her, but the missile turned and headed straight at the _Huascar_, whose turbulent career would most likely have been ended there and then had not one of her lieutenants dived overboard at the torpedo and diverted it so that it missed the warship by a few inches. As soon as the Chilians heard that the Peruvian fleet had come south, the former left the historic _Esmeralda_ and another wooden ship, the _Covadonga_, which was equally slow, behind at Iquique, and went to look for the Peruvian ships. The latter slipped past in the darkness and sent the _Huascar_ and the _Independencia_ to smash up the two wooden ships left behind to blockade Iquique. The _Huascar_ attacked the _Esmeralda_ and the _Independencia_ endeavoured to account for the _Covadonga_. Thus, two modern powerful ironclads were opposed to two old wooden ships indifferently armed and painfully slow. On the face of the paper statistics the battle should have lasted four minutes; as it was, it lasted four hours. As soon as the Peruvians on shore saw that the _Esmeralda_ and the _Covadonga_ were to be attacked by the two Peruvian ironclads they opened fire on the blockading ships and compelled the _Esmeralda_ to seek a less favourable position. The _Huascar_, seeing this was a suitable moment, tried to disable her with the ram, but inflicted very little injury. Before this a shell from the _Huascar’s_ turret gun pierced the _Esmeralda’s_ engine room, killing all the engineers and disabling the engines so that for a time the wooden ship was helpless. But the Chilians patched up the engines and got them going again. This one shot from the _Huascar_ was probably due to good luck rather than good shooting, for although she hit once with her turret gun she missed thirty-nine times. The _Esmeralda_, on the contrary, hit the _Huascar_ repeatedly, but her smaller projectiles were harmless against the iron armour, and inflicted no damage to the hull, but the careful firing of the Chilians rendered it very difficult for the _Huascar’s_ crew to expose themselves in any degree on deck for working the other guns. The _Huascar_ again rammed the _Esmeralda_, this time on the starboard bow, and the Chilians with extraordinary bravery attempted to carry the ironclad by boarding it, but in the confusion the order to board was not understood, and the attempt consequently failed. Again the _Huascar_ rammed, now making a great gaping wound in the side of her feeble opponent, through which the water rushed and caused her to founder in a few minutes. She went down with her colours flying, all her wounded on board, and nearly all the rest of her crew.