Sighting the smoke from a large approaching force, Hipper headed south-east by 07:35 to escape but Beatty's ships were faster than the German squadron, which was held back by the slower armoured cruiser Blücher and the coal-fuelled torpedo boats.
The British ships were relatively unscathed until 10:18, when Derfflinger hit Lion with several shells, damaging her engines and causing flooding, so that Lion lost speed and began to fall behind.