HMS Challenger (K07)

HMS Challenger was a unique vessel in Royal Navy service, purpose built to support deep sea operations and saturation diving. Built by Scotts at Greenock, the ship was launched on 19 May 1981, but not commissioned until 1984, during a time when the Royal Navy was cutting back on expenditure. The consequence was that the £80m Challenger was seen as an extravagance that the Admiralty could not afford. As a consequence, after only a few years service, in 1990 the ship was laid up and offered for sale.

In 1993 the ship was purchased by a company called Subsea Offshore, to be converted for work decontaminating hazardous waste dumped in the Baltic Sea and North Atlantic.

The vessel was later bought by the Namibian Minerals Corporation (NAMCO), and fitted with equipment to recover diamonds from the sea floor. The ship was converted at the Nauta Shipyard in Gdynia, Poland, and made its first diamond recoveries in December 2000. The ship was bought by De Beers in April 2003 for US$20 million.