Impavido.
Class overview
Operators:	Marina Militare
Preceded by:	Impetuoso
Followed by:	Audace
Decommissioned:	Retired
Ships in class:	2
Ships out of service:	2
General Characteristics
Displacement:	3,940 tons full load
Length:	130.9
Beam:	13.6 m
Draught:	4.5 m
Propulsion and power:	2 shaft geared turbines, 4 Foster Wheeler boilers, 70,000 hp
Speed:	34 knots
Range:	6,000 miles at 16 knots
Complement:	333
Armament:	1 Tartar SSM system 2 127/38 mm guns 4 76/62 mm guns 6 x 324 mm triple torpedo launchers
Aircraft carried:	1 helicopter

The Impavido class were the second group of destroyers built for the Italian Navy after World War II and the first Italian Guided Missile destroyers. Image File history File links Naval_Ensign_of_Italy. ... Marina Militare naval jack Marina Militare (the Italian Navy) is one of the four branches of the military forces of Italy. ... The Audace class destroyers were two guided missile destroyers built for the Italian Navy during the Cold War. ... A surface-to-surface missile (SSM) is a guided projectile launched from a hand-held, vehicle mounted, trailer mounted or fixed installation or from a ship. ... For other uses, see Helicopter (disambiguation). ... USS McFaul underway in the Atlantic Ocean. ... Marina Militare naval jack Marina Militare (the Italian Navy) is one of the four branches of the military forces of Italy. ... Combatants Allied powers: China France Great Britain Soviet Union United States and others Axis powers: Germany Italy Japan and others Commanders Chiang Kai-shek Charles de Gaulle Winston Churchill Joseph Stalin Franklin Roosevelt Adolf Hitler Benito Mussolini Hideki Tōjō Casualties Military dead: 17,000,000 Civilian dead: 33,000...

Similar in performance to the American Charles F. Adams class, these ships were essentially improved Impetuoso class destroyers, with the after gun turret replaced by a Tartar Surface to Air Missile launcher and associated radar. Apart from the same main armament of 'Adams', the emphasis of the weaponry was focused on anti-aircraft equipments, so the secondary armament wasn't the ASROC missile, but a battery of 76mm automatic guns fitted in the midship. The 127mm guns remained, however, the same of wartime, Mk 38, while Adams had the newer Mk 42 covering all the horizon thanks to their disposition, fore and aft deck. The class of guided missile destroyers was a group of twenty-nine built between 1958 and 1967. ... A Tartar missile on its launcher on the Cassard frigate The US-built Tartar missile is an important element of zone defence (here, launched from a US destroyer of the Perry class) The US-built Tartar SM1 is a medium-range anti-air system. ...

These ships were important because they represented the first of the missile destroyers of MMI and lasted in service for many years, even if they hadn't any important update and so they were progressive obsolescent ships. Characteristic of these ship were superstructures, with a much less clean layout than the further classes, and the double lines of windows in the main turrion, similar to Alpino frigates.

They were both retired in 1991.

Ships

Impavido in 1983