Royal Navy's last Trafalgar-class submarine completes final voyage prior to decommissioning

The last of the Royal Navy’s Trafalgar-class nuclear-powered attack submarines has arrived home in Plymouth for the final time before decommissioning.

HMS Triumph, the seventh and last boat of the class, sailed into her homeport at Devonport Naval Base after her final voyage from Scotland, thus ending a career of nearly 34 years.

Triumph was laid down in Barrow shipyard in February 1987 and commissioned less than five years later in October 1991, the last of the class to be built after her six sisters HMS Talent, HMS Trenchant, HMS Torbay, HMS Tireless, HMS Turbulent, and HMS Trafalgar.

The boat deployed to Australia in 1993, travelling over 35,000 nautical miles submerged without support – at the time the longest solo deployment by a Royal Navy nuclear-powered submarine.

Triumph served in Afghanistan in 2001, launching Tomahawk missiles at targets, and later deployed to Libya – again firing her weaponry at positions from the Mediterranean Sea as part of international efforts to protect civilians. On both occasions, the boat flew the Jolly Roger flag from her fin as she returned to Plymouth – a Submarine Service tradition that celebrates the completion of a successful combat mission.

The submarine was the tenth Royal Navy vessel to bear the HMS Triumph name. The first was a 680-gun galleon built in 1561 and was the largest built in England during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I.

Triumph will be officially decommissioned in a ceremony early in 2025. The retirement of the Trafalgar-class will make way for the introduction of additional Astute-class nuclear-powered submarines into Royal Navy service.