HMS Conqueror (S48)
Faslane) flying the Jolly Roger after the Falklands War, 4 July 1982
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History | |
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United Kingdom | |
Ordered | 9 August 1966 |
Builder | Cammell Laird, Birkenhead |
Laid down | 5 December 1967 |
Launched | 28 August 1969 |
Commissioned | 9 November 1971 |
Decommissioned | 2 August 1990 |
Nickname(s) | "Conks"[2] |
Honours and awards | Falkland Islands, 1982[1] |
Status | At Devonport awaiting dismantling |
Badge | |
General characteristics | |
Class and type | Churchill-class submarine |
Displacement | 4,900 tonnes (submerged) |
Length | 86.9 m (285 ft) |
Beam | 10.1 m (33 ft) |
Draught | 8.2 m (27 ft) |
Propulsion | One Rolls-Royce PWR nuclear reactor, one shaft |
Speed | 28 knots (52 km/h) (submerged) |
Range | Limited only by food stored on board |
Complement | 103 |
Armament |
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HMS Conqueror was a British Churchill-class nuclear-powered fleet submarine which served in the Royal Navy from 1971 to 1990. She was the third submarine of her class, following the earlier Churchill and Courageous, that were all designed to face the Soviet threat at sea. She was built by Cammell Laird at Birkenhead.
Conqueror is[update] the only nuclear-powered submarine to have engaged an enemy ship with torpedoes, sinking the cruiser General Belgrano during the 1982 Falklands War.[note 1]
Construction
Conqueror was ordered on 9 August 1966 and was
Operational history
Falklands War
Conqueror, commanded by
On 30 April, she detected at a range of 100
After some debate, permission to engage General Belgrano was sent to the submarine from the Commander-in-Chief Fleet and Task Force commander, Admiral Sir John Fieldhouse, at the Royal Navy's command centre in Northwood in the United Kingdom. In the intervening period, General Belgrano had retired from its attack position and turned west, since Veinticinco de Mayo was not yet ready to engage the British fleet. This would cause some controversy, although General Belgrano's captain and the Argentine government acknowledged that the attack was a legitimate act of war.[5][6][7]
On 2 May Conqueror became the first nuclear-powered submarine to sink an enemy surface ship using torpedoes, launching three Mark 8 torpedoes at General Belgrano and the destroyers,[note 2] two of which struck the ship and exploded. Twenty minutes later, the ship was sinking rapidly and was abandoned by her crew. General Belgrano was unable to issue a Mayday signal because of electrical failure; this and poor visibility meant the two escorting destroyers were unaware of the sinking until some hours later. A total of 323 men were killed.[8]
Adding to the confusion, the crew of Bouchard felt an impact that was the third torpedo striking or exploding in proximity to the hull, inflicting more than minor damage with 4 gashes in the hull [9] (an examination of the ship later showed an impact mark consistent with a torpedo). The two ships continued on their course westward and began dropping depth charges. At the time, Conqueror's officers believed they were under attack and continued to regard the two Argentine destroyers as a serious threat to the British task force and later returned to search for the Argentine warships with the aim of sinking the destroyers [10] rather than searching for Belgrano survivors. By the time the Argentine destroyers realised that General Belgrano had actually foundered it was already dark and the weather had worsened, scattering the life rafts.
Conqueror's war did not end there. The crew of the submarine had to face the
After the war, Conqueror returned to Faslane, flying a Jolly Roger, a customary act of Royal Navy submarines after a kill. The flag, now in the Royal Navy Submarine Museum at Gosport, featured an atom for Conqueror being the only nuclear submarine with a kill, crossed torpedoes for the type of weapon used, a dagger indicating a cloak-and-dagger operation, and the outline of a cruiser for what kind of ship was sunk.[13] When asked about the incident later, Commander Wreford-Brown responded, "The Royal Navy spent thirteen years preparing me for such an occasion. It would have been regarded as extremely dreary if I had fouled it up".[14]
Operation Barmaid
Later in 1982, Conqueror completed a raid to acquire a Soviet passive towed sonar array from its Polish-flagged towing vessel. The operation, a joint mission between British and American forces, was conducted on the boundary of Soviet territorial waters. Conqueror used cutters affixed to her bow to shear through the 3 in (76 mm) thick wire before silently returning to her base on the Clyde.[15]
Collision
On 2 July 1988 Conqueror was involved in a collision with the Army Sail Training Association yacht Dalriada south of the Mull of Kintyre. The yacht sank and four crew members were rescued.[16]
Decommissioning
Conqueror was decommissioned in 1990 and the
Notes
- Indo-Pakistani War of 1971.
- Tigerfishtorpedoes, but her captain chose to use the more reliable, 55-year-old Mark 8 design
References
- ^ "Falklands Campaign Battle Honours". Parliamentary Debates (Hansard). 25 October 1983. Archived from the original on 14 July 2009. Retrieved 5 September 2008.
- ^ Hastings, Max; Simon Jenkins (1983). "Chapter 9". The Battle for the Falklands. Bungay, Suffolk: Book Club Associates. p. 147.
- ^ a b Moore 1985, p. 617.
- ^ a b Hennessy and Jinks 2016, pp. 300–301.
- ISBN 978-0-00-215723-0.
- ^ Elliott, Francis (28 December 2003), "'Belgrano' ordered to attack British ships on day before sinking, secret report reveals", The Independent, London, retrieved 2 May 2020
- ^ Belgrano legal action fails, BBC News Report, 19 July 2000
- OCLC 1004977305.
- ^ N. Sethia. Guardian 18 October 2000
- ^ S.Prebble. Secrets of the Conqueror. Faber. London . 2013, p 122
- ^ S. Prebble. Secrets of the Conqueror. Faber & Faber. London 2013, p 126
- ^ N. Sethia. Navy Net blog 14/1/2013 & Declassified file 2016 PREM 19/2017 f 174, which confirms the PM and MOD had cleared the release of info of Lt N. Sethias' unofficial and unapproved, personal log of the HMS Conqueror from 29/4/82 to 6/5/82 covering the Belgrano engagement but not the subsequent Argentine attacks on 7 May or later operations HMS Conqueror
- ^ Photo of HMS Conqueror's Jolly Roger in the Royal Navy Submarine Museum
- ISBN 978-1-55750-651-1. p. 161
- ^ Neil Tweedie (12 October 2012). "HMS Conqueror's biggest secret: a raid on Russia". The Daily Telegraph. London. Retrieved 28 August 2014.
- ^ "HMS Conqueror (Collision)" Hansard HC Deb 21 July 1988 vol 137 cc722-3W
- ^ "MoD criticised over submarine disposal". 3 April 2019. Retrieved 23 October 2019.
Sources
- Hennesey, Peter; Jinks, James (2016). The Silent Deep: The Royal Navy Submarine Service since 1945. Penguin. ISBN 978-0-241-95948-0.
- Moore, John (1985). Jane's Fighting Ships 1985–86. London: Jane's Yearbooks. ISBN 0-7106-0814-4.
Further reading
- Rossiter, Mike (2007). Sink the Belgrano. Bantam Press. ISBN 978-0-593-05842-8.
External links
- Hansard: Loss of the "control room log" of HMS Conqueror Archived 17 April 2022 at the Wayback Machine