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Trafalgar-class nuclear-powered attack submarine of the Royal Navy From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
HMS Trafalgar is a decommissioned Trafalgar-class submarine of the Royal Navy. Unlike the rest of the Trafalgar-class boats that followed, she was not launched with a pump-jet propulsion system, but with a conventional 7-bladed propeller.[3] Trafalgar was the fifth vessel of the Royal Navy to bear the name, after the 1805 Battle of Trafalgar.
HMS Trafalgar, 2008 | |
History | |
---|---|
United Kingdom | |
Name | HMS Trafalgar |
Namesake | Battle of Trafalgar |
Ordered | 7 April 1977 |
Builder | Vickers Shipbuilding and Engineering, Barrow-in-Furness |
Laid down | 15 April 1979 |
Launched | 1 July 1981 |
Commissioned | 27 May 1983 |
Decommissioned | 4 December 2009 |
Homeport | HMNB Devonport, Plymouth |
Fate | Awaiting Disposal |
Badge | |
General characteristics [1] | |
Class and type | Trafalgar-class submarine |
Displacement | |
Length | 85.4 m (280 ft)[2] |
Beam | 9.8 m (32 ft)[2] |
Draught | 9.5 m (31 ft)[2] |
Propulsion |
|
Speed | Over 30 knots (56 km/h), submerged[2] |
Range | Unlimited[2] |
Complement | 130[2] |
Electronic warfare & decoys |
|
Armament | |
Service record | |
Operations: | Operation Veritas (Afghanistan) |
In 2012 a Royal Navy submariner was jailed for 8 years for trying "to pass secrets to the Russians that could have undermined Britain's national security"; one element of this was information on "a secret operation undertaken by HMS Trafalgar.[4][5]
After Operation Veritas, the attack on Al-Qaeda and Taliban forces following the September 11 attacks in the United States, Trafalgar entered Plymouth Sound flying the Jolly Roger on 1 March 2002. She was welcomed back by Admiral Sir Alan West, Commander-in-Chief of the fleet and it emerged she was the first Royal Navy submarine to launch Tomahawk cruise missiles against Afghanistan.[6]
In July 1996, Trafalgar grounded near the Isle of Skye in Scotland.[7]
In November 2002, Trafalgar again ran aground close to the Isle of Skye, causing £5 million worth of damage to her hull and injuring three sailors. She was travelling 50 metres below the surface at more than 14 knots when Lieutenant-Commander Tim Green, a student in the "Perisher" course for new submarine commanders, ordered a course change that took her onto the rocks at Fladda-chuain, a small but well-charted islet. Commander Robert Fancy, responsible for navigation, and Commander Ian McGhie, an instructor, both pleaded guilty at court-martial to contributing to the accident. On 9 March 2004 the court reprimanded both for negligence. Green was not prosecuted, but received an administrative censure.[8]
In May 2008 it was reported that the crash was caused by the chart being used in the exercise being covered with tracing paper, to prevent students marking it.[9]
Trafalgar was decommissioned on 4 December 2009 at Devonport.[10]
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