HMS Onyx (S21): The Only Conventional Submarine to Fight in the Falklands

Built at Birkenhead

HMS Onyx was built by Cammell Laird, laid down on 16 November 1964, launched on 18 August 1966 and commissioned on 20 November 1967, an Oberon-class submarine displacing 1,610 tons standard, fitted with Type 186 and Type 187 sonars alongside I-band radar, armed with eight 21-inch torpedo tubes and crewed by 68 officers and ratings.

The Only Conventional Boat in the Falklands

Onyx holds the distinctive honour of being the only non-nuclear submarine of the Royal Navy to take part in the Falklands War, a demanding deployment for a diesel-electric boat operating alongside the nuclear-powered submarines that otherwise dominated the campaign.

She carried out reconnaissance photography and landed Special Boat Service and Special Air Service special forces teams in shallow waters that the larger nuclear boats could not safely approach, exactly the kind of close-inshore work her smaller size made her uniquely suited for.

She suffered bow damage during these operations, the cause disputed between an uncharted underwater pinnacle and an Argentine air attack, but continued her mission regardless.

A Memorably Irreverent Motto

Onyx's ship's motto, Taurus excreta cerebrum vincit, translates rather bluntly as 'bullshit conquers brains', a wonderfully irreverent touch of submariners' humour for a boat that had, in reality, performed some of the most dangerous and demanding work of the entire Falklands campaign.

A Museum That Could Not Last

HMS Onyx was decommissioned in 1991 and put on display at Birkenhead before being purchased in 2006 for a planned heritage museum in Barrow-in-Furness. When that museum ran into financial difficulties, Onyx was towed to Rosneath in Scotland in April 2014 and scrapped later that year, a rather deflating end for a submarine whose Falklands service had been notably remarkable.