„Viribus Unitis“ – the Austro - Hungarian battleship

„Viribus Unitis” was the flagship of the combined Austro-Hungarian navy. The sailors of their navy, like the army, were recruited from all the lands, subordinated to these states: the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Bosnia, Croatia, part of Poland, Ukraine and Romania. The main port of the Navy was Pola (now Pula) on the Adriatic Sea. There was also a shipyard and docks. Since 1910 several liners of the so-called "Tegethoff" class have been launched. Three of them - "Tegethoff", "Viribus Unitis" and "Prinz Eugen" were built according to the same project in Trieste. The fourth ship, “Szent Istvan”, was built at the Hungarian shipyard in Fiuma (now Rijeka) and had only two propellers. The arrangement of superstructures also differed. The ships were built by Prague-born ship engineer Sigfrid Popper. He had good connections with English constructors, so his ships met the British standards of the time, both for better and for worse. The tonnage of the ships was reduced due to the carrying capacity of the docks in Austria-Hungary at the time. Popper chose elevated three-barreled turrets for the ships to accommodate their armament of choice, 12x 305 mm “Škoda”-built 45-caliber long guns, which matched the German and Russian guns and significantly outnumbered the wire-braced British and Italian guns. The “Viribus Unitis” became the first ship with such an arrangement of artillery. The ship's name translates as “united force” - it was the motto of Tsar Francis Joseph. The keel of "Viribus Unitis" was laid on 1910. 07. 23, 1911. 06. 24 the ship was launched and given the name "Viribus Unitis". 1912. 12. 05 the ship is handed over to the Austro-Hungarian Navy and begins service. 1913.06.13 - 07.06 participates in the Skutari operation - blocks the coasts of Montenegro together with the fleets of European states. 1914. 03.30 - 06. 07 together with "Tegethoff" and "Zrinyj" makes its only foreign voyage - visits Kumbor, Izmir, Adalia, Mersin, Iskenderun, Beirut, Alexandria, La Valletta. 1914.02.24 - 07.01 - the last journey of the heir to the throne Duke Francis Ferdinand, which he started with his wife on this ship and visited Trieste and Ploce, returned on the yacht "Dalmat". During this trip the prince arrived in Sarajevo, where he was shot. This act of terror became the cause of World War I. The ship took part in several sea battles of this war, shelling enemy shore positions. On 11.10.1918, two Italian divers attached a clockwork mine to the ship's hull at 6:30 am. The divers were caught and should have perished with the ship, but were saved by the ship's captain, who later died himself, when a mine exploded. In the thirties, the remains of the ship, lying at the bottom of the harbor area, were divided into three parts by explosions and gradually raised.

A complex, large for its scale, well designed model of a large ship for intermediate to advanced modelers.