HMS Venerable (R63)
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HMS Venerable (R63) was a Colossus-class aircraft carrier of the Royal Navy. She served for only the last few months of World War II, In 1948 she was sold to the Netherlands and renamed HNLMS Karel Doorman (R81), and subsequently sold to Argentina and renamed Veinticinco de Mayo.
Venerable was laid down at Cammel Laird in Birkenhead on 3 December 1942, launched just over a year later, and commissioned on 17 January 1945. As with others of the class completed just before the ending of hostilities, Venerable immediately headed to the Far East to join the 11th Aircraft Carrier Squadron of the British Pacific Fleet. After hostilities were over, Venerable repatriated prisoners of war to Canada and Australia, before returning to the UK.
In 1948, Venerable's short career in the Royal Navy came to an end, when it was sold to the Dutch. The ship recommissioned in the Dutch fleet as Karel Doorman.
After a boiler-room fire, she was sold to Argentina and renamed Veinticinco de Mayo (the twenty-fifth of May, a national holiday in Argentina). The Argentinians already operated a carrier, Independencia, a sister ship of Veinticinco de Mayo. After Independencia was decommissioned in 1970, Veinticinco de Mayo was the sole remaining carrier in the Argentine fleet and could carry up to 24 aircraft, mainly Skyhawks and Dassault Super Étendard jets.
During the Falklands War in 1982, Veinticinco de Mayo was deployed in a task force north of the Falkland Islands, with the light cruiser General Belgrano to the south. The British had assigned Spartan, a nuclear powered submarine, to track down the Veinticinco de Mayo and sink her if necessary.
After hostilities broke out on May 1, 1982, Veinticinco de Mayo attempted to launch a wave of Skyhawk jets against the Royal Navy taskforce. However poor winds prevented their launch. After the submarine HMS Conqueror sank General Belgrano, Veinticinco de Mayo returned to port, lest it too be sunk. Spartan never tracked down the carrier.
By 1985 Veinticinco de Mayo was largely confined to port and was more or less unseaworthy. In 2000 she was towed to India and is now believed to have been scrapped.
See HMS Venerable and HNLMS Karel Doorman for other ships of this name.
