Oops!

[SUBMAN1]

Amazing some of this stuff still floats!

-S

http://www.weldreality.com/ship-in-two-halfs-great-sho.gif

http://www.hydrolance.net/Common/SinkingOilShip-8.jpg

http://www.isleofportlandpictures.org.uk/ShipWrecks/JC03106.jpg

http://www.worldwideflood.com/ark/hull_calcs/SModulus_files/ship_broken.jpg

http://www.weldreality.com/ship-broken-in-two-x.gif

[Raptor1]

Ouch

Must be a serial ship-cutter, was it...Hey you, why are you sneaking out the back door like that?!

Oh, does that stuff really float, or is it just beached in the shallow water?

[orwell]

The Front fell off! (http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1790237)

[rifleman13]

Will it float?, Will it float? Will it float? Will it float? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sketches_on_Letterman#Will_It_Float.3F)
:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

[Raptor1]

The Front fell off! (http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1790237)
"All there is is sea, and birds, and fish...and 20,000 tons of crude oil...and a fire...and the part of the ship that the front fell off, but there's nothing else out there"

:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

[AVGWarhawk]

Just goes to show you what pawns we are when it comes to some types of weather and the sea.

[Platapus]

I guess if a tanker can seal some of the internal tanks with air it would take a lot to sink it. But some of those pictures are incredible!

[FIREWALL]

In the last pic it looks like their in a race. :p

[Etienne]

For the record, the Prestige sank. Most of the time, a ship that splits - er, suffers a disaster level structural deformity incident, will go down. Often, however, the break will happpen either as a result of a grounding (Tides are hell on a grounded ship's structure) or because of uneven stress while loading, especially high density cargo like ore or concentrate. In those cases, the boat will hit the bottom rather quickly, and might be worth salvaging and repairing.

Some interesting reading:

Structural faillure due to uneven load:
http://www.bst.gc.ca/en/reports/marine/2000/m00C0026/m00C0026.asp
(I especially love that someone converted the drafts to metrics with 3 digits after the decimal)

Structural faillure at sea due to weather and strange ballasting decision:
http://www.tsb.gc.ca/en/reports/marine/1998/m98n0001/m98n0001.asp