HMS M2

Four M-class submarines replaced the order for the last four K class, K17-K21. Although they were similar in size, the M-class was an entirely different design from the K-class although it is possible that some material ordered for the K-boats went into them. In the event the end of the First World War meant that only three were completed.

M2 was laid down in 1916 at Vickers shipyard at Barrow in Furness in 1916 and like the other members of her class were armed with a single 12 inch gun as well as torpedo tubes. The Mark IX gun was taken from spares held for the Formidable class of battleships.

After the accidental sinking of HMS M1 in 1925 she and her sister M3 were taken out of service and reassigned for experimental use. She had her gun removed because of the limit in submarine gun calibre of 8 inches imposed by the Washington Naval Treaty, and it was replaced by a small aircraft hangar, the work being completed in 1928. This could carry a small Parnall Peto seaplane, specially designed for the M2 and which could be launched by steam catapult within a few minutes of surfacing. The aircraft would land alongside the submarine on completion of its sortie and be winched aboard using a crane. The submarine was to operate ahead of the battle fleet in a reconaissance role, and flying off her seaplane as a scout.

The accident

M2 left her base at Portland on 26 January 1932 for an exercise in West Bay. Her last communication was a radio message at 10:11 to her depot ship to announce that she would dive at 10:30 am. The captain of a passing merchant ship, the Newcastle coaster Tynsider, mentioned that he had seen a large submarine dive stern first at around 11:15. Unaware of the significance of this, he only reported it in passing once he reached port.

Her crew of 60 were all killed in the accident. The submarine was found on 3 February, eight days after her loss. Strenous attempts were made to raise her, and after nearly a year and 1500 dives on 8 December 1932 she was lifted to within six metres of the surface, but a gale blew up and the submarine had to be dropped back onto the sea bed.

The hangar door was found open and the aircraft still in it. The accident was believed to be due to water entering the submarine through the hangar door which had been opened to launch the aircraft shortly after surfacing. This is a similar reason to the loss of the Herald of Free Enterprise in 1987; which capsized when the sea entered the ship through the large car-deck door which was close to the waterline.

Two explanations have been advanced. The first is that since the crew were always trying to beat their record time for launching the aircraft, they had simply opened the hangar door on surfacing whilst the deck was still awash. The other theory is that the flooding of the hangar was due to failure of the stern hydroplanes. High pressure air tanks were used to bring the boat to the surface in an awash condition but to conserve this limited resource, compressors were then started to completely clear the ballast tanks of water by blowing air into them. This could take as long as 15 minutes to complete. The normal procedure for launching the aircraft was therefore to hold the boat on the surface using the hydroplanes whilst the hangar door was opened and the aircraft launched. Failure of the rear hydroplanes would have sent the stern down as observed by the merchant officers and water would have eventually entered the hangar.

The aftermath

The submarine currently lies upright on the sea bed at (). Her keel is about 32 metres below the surface at low tide, and her highest point at the top of the conning tower at around 20 metres. She is a popular dive for scuba divers.

With the loss of M2, the Royal Navy abandoned submarine-launched aircraft, although most other navies also experimented with the concept in the interwar years. Possibly the last and the most impressive aircraft carrying submarines were the Japanese Sen Toku class which were three times the size of M2. The largest submarines of the Second World War, each carried three seaplanes and were intended to launch air attacks on the Panama Canal and American West Coast cities but the war ended before they saw action.

References