Name HMS Turpin Commissioned 18 December 1944 Commissioned 1967 Launched 5 August 1943 Builder Chatham Dockyard | Laid down 24 May 1943 Name INS Leviathan Construction started 24 May 1943 Length 84 m | |
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Fate sold to Israeli Navy as INS Leviathan in 1965 | ||
HMS Turpin (pennant number P354) was one a group three T-class submarines of the Royal Navy which entered service in the last few months of World War II. So far she has been the only ship of the Royal Navy to be named Turpin. She was sold to Israel in 1965 and commissioned into the Israeli Sea Corps in 1967 as INS Leviathan.
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As HMS Turpin
At the end of the war, all surviving Group 1 and Group 2 boats were scrapped, but the group 3 boats (which were of welded rather than riveted construction) were retained and fitted with snort masts. In 1955, Turpin was inside the arctic circle on an ELINT mission, listening for specific frequency bands of Soviet radars. Suddenly, the ELINT specialist noted an unusual signal that was from a very short range radar. The operator registered that they were about to be rammed by a Soviet Navy surface vessel, and a crash dive was ordered. The Turpin submerged below a cold water line which allowed them to evade Soviet sonar and escape.
Turpin was sold to the Israeli Navy in 1965, and renamed Leviathan, after a biblical sea monster.
As INS Leviathan
The submarine was purchased by Israel, along with two of her T-class sisters, in 1965, HMS Truncheon and HMS Totem. She was commissioned into the Israeli Sea Corps in 1967.
She was eventually scrapped in 1978. A Dolphin class submarine named Leviathan was commissioned 2000 to the Israeli Navy.