HMS ''Grampus'' (S04) was a ''Porpoise''-class submarine. Her keel was laid down in 1955 by

Cammell Laird Cammell Laird is a British shipbuilding company. It was formed from the merger of Laird Brothers of Birkenhead and Johnson Cammell & Co of Sheffield at the turn of the twentieth century. The company also built railway rolling stock until 1929, ...

Birkenhead Birkenhead (; cy, Penbedw) is a town in the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral, Merseyside, England; Historic counties of England, historically, it was part of Cheshire until 1974. The town is on the Wirral Peninsula, along the south bank of the R ...

. She was launched by Lady Shepheard on 30 May 1957. She was first commissioned on 19 December 1958.

Service

On 1 April 1963, ''Grampus'' returned to

Gosport Gosport ( ) is a town and non-metropolitan borough on the south coast of Hampshire, South East England. At the 2011 Census, its population was 82,662. Gosport is situated on a peninsula on the western side of Portsmouth Harbour, opposite ...

after spending three weeks under the polar icecap looking for holes in the ice. During the patrol she superficially damaged her hull on the ice. During 1965 she refitted in Devonport Dockyard. In 1964 she was commanded by Lieutenant-Commander J F Woodward RN. On 11 January 1968, the French trawler ''Fomalhaut'' caught ''Grampus'' in her nets in the

English Channel The English Channel, "The Sleeve"; nrf, la Maunche, "The Sleeve" ( Cotentinais) or (Jèrriais), ( Guernésiais), "The Channel"; br, Mor Breizh, "Sea of Brittany"; cy, Môr Udd, "Lord's Sea"; kw, Mor Bretannek, "British Sea"; nl, Het Kan ...

. ''Grampus'' surfaced and both crews spent over three hours disentangling the nets. In 1968 she was part of the First Submarine Squadron based at HMS Dolphin and in that year was present during 'Navy Days' in Portsmouth Dockyard. ''Grampus'' operated with USS ''Tigrone'' in a joint American-British oceanographic operation in the eastern Atlantic in 1972. ''Grampus'' sank on 18 September 1980 in Loch Fyne as she was being towed as a sonar target. She sits upright in 120 metres of water.

References

Publications

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Grampus British Porpoise-class submarines Ships built on the River Mersey 1957 ships