That does seem to be the consensus... Broke in half because of a "perfect storm" combination of reasons. There's speculation too that EF scraped the nearby shoal that wasn't quite mapped perfectly.
We'll never know, and it doesn't matter because it wouldn't bring those young men back if we did. IMO the Captain's last words, "We're holding our own" was because he knew they were going down and he didn't want to say the truth where the crew could hear it... maybe it was quick for them. RIP.
Lightfoot's song is a classic "in his style", IMO. Look at how many still talk about it...
All the experts say it broke up on the surface. It was overloaded and did not have the structural integrity to take those kinds of waves holding that kind of weightI
A body was discovered wearing a life jacket. That is intrepreted to mean that they knew what was coming.
It had to be terrifying.