HMAS Vampire (D11)

HMAS Vampire (D11) was one of the first all-welded ships built in Australia, she was constructed at Cockatoo Island Dockyard between 1952 and 1959. HMAS Vampire was regularly deployed to Southeast Asia during her service.

HMAS Vampire was attached to the Far East Strategic Reserve on five occasions, including during the Indonesia-Malaysia Confrontation, and escorted the troop transport HMAS Sydney on six of the latter’s twenty-five transport voyages to Vietnam. Vampire remained in service until 1986, when she was decommissioned and presented to the Australian National Maritime Museum for preservation as a museum ship.

Exploring Shipwrecks & Maritime Museums

• Batavia Timbers
• Mariner’s Astrolabe from the Vergulde Draeck
• Australian National Maritime Museum
• New Zealand Maritime Museum
• Queensland Maritime Museum
• WA Maritime Museum
• WA Shipwrecks Museum
• Intrepid, Sea, Air & Space Museum, New York
• USS Cod
• HMAS Vampire (D11)
• HMAS Onslow
• Harding MCH Lifeboat
• Cape Bowling Green Light
• Tu Do – Vietnamese Refugee Boat
• The de Vlamingh Plate

HMAS Vampire (D11)

• Exhibit:                      HMAS Vampire (D11)
• Builder:                     Cockatoo Island Dockyard
• Commissioned:        1959
• Decommissioned:    1986
• Motto:                        “Audamus”  Latin: “Let Us Be Daring”
• Status:                        Preserved as museum ship
• Class and type:         Daring class destroyer
• Displacement:          3,560 tons full load
• Length:                      388 ft 11.5 in (118.6 m)
• Beam:                        42 ft 11.375 in (13.1 m)
• Draught:                   12 ft 9 in (3.9 m)
• Propulsion:               2 × Foster Wheeler boilers, 2 shafts, 54,000 shp (40,000 kW)
• Speed:                        Over 30 knots (56 km/h; 35 mph)
• Range:                        3,700 nautical miles (6,900 km; 4,300 mi)
• Complement:           20 officers, 300 sailors
• Museum:                  Australian National Maritime Museum

Highlights of the Australian National Maritime Museum

• HMAS Vampire (D11)
• HMAS Onslow
• Harding MCH Lifeboat
• Cape Bowling Green Light
• Tu Do – Vietnamese Refugee Boat

Maritime Museums

• Australian National Maritime Museum
• New Zealand Maritime Museum
• Queensland Maritime Museum
• WA Maritime Museum
• WA Shipwrecks Museum
• Intrepid, Sea, Air & Space Museum, New York
• USS Cod
• Cutty Sark, Royal Museums Greenwich
• National Maritime Museum, Greenwich
• Old Royal Naval College, Greenwich
• HMS Belfast
• Museum of London Docklands
• Internationales Maritimes Museum Hamburg

Museum Ships

• Intrepid, Sea, Air & Space Museum, New York
• USS Cod
• Cutty Sark, Royal Museums Greenwich
• HMS Belfast
• HMAS Vampire (D11)
• HMAS Onslow
• HMAS Diamantina
• Forceful – Tugboat
• HMAS Ovens

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“Set your course by the stars, not by the lights of every passing ship.”
– Omar N. Bradley

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Photo Credit: GM