Vice Admiral Beatty was again tasked with intercepting and destroying Hipper's battlecruisers.[1] At 08:14 on 24 January, the German cruiser Kolberg spotted the light cruiser Aurora and several destroyers from the Harwich Force, which had been attached to support Beatty's battlecruiser squadron. Hipper immediately turned his battlecruisers towards the gunfire, when, almost simultaneously, Stralsund spotted a large amount of smoke to the northwest of her position.