HMS Viper (1899)

Viper
History
United Kingdom
Name	Viper
Ordered	4 March 1898
Builder	Hawthorn Leslie and Company
Laid down	1898
Launched	6 September 1899
Commissioned	1900
Fate	Struck rocks near Alderney, 3 August 1901
General characteristics [1]
Class and type	Viper-class torpedo boat destroyer
Displacement	344 long tons (350 t) normal 393 long tons (399 t) deep load
Length	210 ft 3+1⁄2 in (64.10 m)
Beam	21 ft (6.40 m)
Draught	9 ft 9 in (2.97 m)
Propulsion	Parsons turbines, 10,600 ihp (7,904 kW)
Speed	33.8 knots (63 km/h; 39 mph)
Complement	68
Armament	1 × 12 pounder gun 5 × 6 pounder guns 2 × torpedo tubes

HMS Viper was a Viper-class torpedo boat destroyer (or "TBD") built for the British Royal Navy in 1899 by Hawthorn Leslie and Company at Hebburn on the River Tyne.

She was notable for being the first warship to use steam turbine propulsion ^[2] and was manufactured by Parsons Marine. There were four shafts, with two propellers on each, one inboard and one outboard of the shaft A-bracket.

Viper and another turbine-powered ship, the Armstrong Whitworth special-type Cobra were both lost to accidents in 1901: Viper foundered on rocks in fog during naval manoeuvres near Alderney on 3 August 1901, while Cobra broke her back in a storm in the North Sea on 18 September 1901.