퇴역이 임박한 영국의 마지막 트라팔가급 SSN HMS Triumph

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12월 10일 7척이 건조된 트라팔가급 잠수함 최종함이 HMS Triumph가 파스레인을 떠나 퇴역장소인 데본포트로 향했다고 합니다. 

1991년 10월 취역해 33년 동안 운용됐네요. 

영국은 트라팔가급 7척을 8년 동안, 뱅가드급 SSBN 4척을 6년 동안 취역시키고 한동안 잠수함 프로그램을 진행시키지 않아 숙련된 관련 사업 인력들이 죄다 흩어져버렸고, 트라팔가급을 대체할 아스튜트급은 7척을 취역시키는 데 16년(2010년 8월 27일~2026년 후반 예정)이 걸렸습니다. 

Royal Navy’s last Trafalgar-class submarine sails for the final time | Navy Lookout

December 10, 2024

Current NewsRoyal Navy’s last Trafalgar-class submarine sails for the final time

HMS Triumph sailed from Faslane today for the final time, heading to Devonport where she will decommission.

HMS Triumph was laid down at Barrow Shipyard in February 1987 and commissioned less than 5 years later in October 1991, the last of the seven Trafalgar class submarines constructed for the RN. The highly successful T-boat programme delivered 7 boats over an 8-year period. She represents the zenith of UK submarine design and construction efficiency, driven by the need to face down the Soviet submarine fleet. The T-boats, widely acknowledged as the best SSN design of the Cold War, were still proving effective well into the 2020s.

Triumph’s construction bridged the period that saw the end of the Soviet Union and the subsequent ‘peace dividend’, which was exploited to excess by generations of politicians which has resulted in the diminished state of the RN today. Among the most toxic legacies of post-Cold-War mismanagement was the failure to order new submarines when the construction of the Vanguard class concluded in the late 1990s. Without work, the specialist submarine designers and constructors with skills and experience acquired over decades rapidly dispersed. The lack of skilled people was the root cause of the problems and delays that have plagued the Astute class programme and continue to impact SSN availability today.

An image that looks straight out of the early 1990s – HMS Cattistock says farewell to HMS Triumph in the Firth of Clyde, 29 November 2024 (Photo taken from 820 NAS Merlin).

There is limited information about Triumph’s service to the nation in the public domain for obvious reasons but she has been deployed across the globe. In the 1990s this involved tracking the much-reduced Russian submarine fleet in the High North and North Atlantic but as time went on, RN submarines were increasingly sent further afield, particularly to the Middle East. In 1998 the Tomahawk Land Attack missile entered service with the RN and for many years, at least one T or S-class boat was kept deployed East of Suez as the ‘duty TLAM boat’, ready to respond to events in the region.

Triumph has fired Tomahawk missiles in anger on at least 3 occasions, each time flying the Jolly Roger flag to mark a successful combat patrol on her return home. In 2001 she participated in Operation Veritas, launching strikes against terrorist targets in Afghanistan. In 2011 she conducted two separate patrols as part of Operation Ellamy, firing TLAM against targets in Libya in March and again in June.

HMS Triumph arrived on the Clyde on 29th November following her final duty, conducting Submarine Command Course (SMCC) ‘Perisher’ training. She unloaded her weapons at Coulport before further de-storing at Faslane (Alongside in Faslane on 6th Dec. Photo: Stuart Wolf).

Between 2005-10 Triumph underwent a £300 million nuclear refuel and mid-life refit in Devonport which included the fitting of the world-renowned sonar 2076 system. In December 2022 HMS Triumph completed a refit that lasted more than 4 years (technically a Reval‎idation and Assisted Maintenance Period – RAMP). Although prolonged by COVID, the unknown £multi-million cost and effort expended to get just 2 years more service out of the boat looks somewhat desperate. In a familiar story, the RN has little choice but to keep old vessels going due to delays to their replacements (and the exceptionally high value of even just one old SSN).

Once the reactor has become life-expired there is no option but to decommission the boat. Life extension is not realistic as nuclear refuelling a submarine more than 30 years old would not be a sensible use of funds, even if there was the industrial capacity available to support such a massive project

She will be formally decommissioned at a ceremony in early 2025 before spending up to 2 years with a skeleton crew being prepared for long-term storage afloat. She will then join the fleet of boats in 3 Basin at Devonport to await disposal. At the current rate of progress, it will be well into the 2040s before she is recycled.

The RN SSN fleet will become an all-Astute class force which will simplify support and training. Numbers will go back down to an ‘on-paper’ strength of 5 boats with HMS Agamemnon in the engineering test and commissioning phase at Barrow but a long way off becoming an operational submarine. Output has improved in the latter part of 2024 with HMS Astute and Anson at sea at the time of writing, HMS Artful is likely to regenerate next year. HMS Ambush is at very low readiness having been store-robbed to maintain the others, an indictment of the failure to make better through-life support provision for the class. HMS Audacious was supposed to have entered dry dock in Devonport by now.

Streaming the decommissioning pennant and saluted by tugs as she passed through the Rhu Narrows (Photo: Marc Sibbald).

The story of HMS Triumph is ultimately about the people who served in her, many of the stories can’t be told but you can be sure they made a significant contribution to the security of the nation from 1991-2024.

Main image: Sailing down the Clyde for the last time on 10th December (Photo: Stuart Wolf).

Vanguard-class submarine - Wikipedia

Astute-class submarine - Wikipedia

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8년에 7척을 뽑았으니 효율적이긴 했지만 후속 사업이 없어서...

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뱅가드 프로젝트 끝난 시점에서 1번함 취역한 지 20년도 안 됐으니 바로 후속함 건조를 이어가기는 어렵긴 했겠습니다.