Trident System in Operation
The Trident system is made up of 58 leased Trident II D-5 missiles, four native Vanguard-class ballistic missile submarines and 160 operational thermonuclear weapon warheads, together with command-and-control and other supporting infrastructure.
Each of the submarines can carry up to 16 Trident II D-5 submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs), with each missile capable of carrying up to 12 independently targetable nuclear warheads. This makes for a potential maximum of 192 warheads per submarine. The current loading is unknown, although the 2010 Strategic Defence and Security Review set out that in the future each submarine would be armed with 8 missiles and a maximum of 40 warheads.
Most of the warheads have a yield of 80-100 kilotons, although there has been speculation that some missiles may be armed with a single low-yield nuclear warhead of 10-15 kilotons.
Read more about this topic: UK Trident Programme
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