Viper-class destroyer

Class overview
HMS Viper
Builders:	Hawthorn Leslie and Company
Operators:	Royal Navy
In commission:	1899–1915
Completed:	2
Lost:	2
General characteristics
Type:	Torpedo boat destroyer
Displacement:	344 long tons (350 t)
Length:	210 ft (64 m)
Beam:	21 ft (6.4 m)
Draught:	7 ft (2.1 m)
Propulsion:	Parsons turbines, 10,000 ihp (7,457 kW)
Speed:	36.5 knots (67.6 km/h; 42.0 mph)
Complement:	68
Armament:	1 × 12 pounder gun 5 × 6 pounder guns 2 × torpedo tubes

The Viper class was a group of two torpedo boat destroyers (or "TBDs") built for the British Royal Navy in 1899.

They were notable for being the first warships to use steam turbine propulsion. They had Parsons turbines on four shafts, with two propellers on each, one inboard and one outboard of the shaft A-bracket.

Viper was ordered and built for the Royal Navy in 1899 by Hawthorn Leslie and Company at Hebburn on the River Tyne. Python was built as a speculative venture by Hawthorns and was purchased in 1902.

Turbine of HMS Velox

Viper and another turbine-powered ship, the Vickers 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. Since then the Royal Navy has not used snake names for destroyers; Python was renamed Velox soon after. Velox was rated as a C-class destroyer in 1913, that is, one of a heterogeneous group of 30-knot torpedo boat destroyer with three funnels.

The ships were considered successes when acquired, achieving speeds of up to 36 knots on trials. All subsequent British destroyers from the River or E class of 1903 to the County class of 1960 used steam turbine machinery.

Ships

Viper, launched 6 September 1899, wrecked near Alderney on 3 August 1901.
Python, later renamed Velox, launched 11 February 1902, mined and sunk off Nab light vessel, 25 October 1915.

References

Lyon, David (1996). The First Destroyers. ISBN 1-84067-364-8.

Three-funnel 30-knotter torpedo boat destroyers (reclassified in 1912 as C-class destroyers)

Palmer 30 knotters	Bat Chamois Crane Fawn Flirt Flying Fish Star Whiting

Earl 30 knotters	Bullfinch Dove

Doxford 30 knotters	Lee Sylvia Violet

Vickers 30 knotters	Avon Bittern Leopard Otter Vixen

Clydebank 30 knotters	Brazen Electra Recruit Vulture Kestrel Thorn Tiger Vigilant

Hawthorn Leslie 30 knotters	Cheerful Mermaid Greyhound Racehorse Roebuck

Fairfields 30 knotters	Fairy Falcon Gipsy Leven Osprey Ostrich

Thornycroft 33 knotters	Albatross

Parsons turbine specials	Velox Viper

Preceded by: B class Followed by: D class List of destroyers of the Royal Navy

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