HSwMS Spica, Museum ship at Vasa Museum in Stockholm, Sweden.
HSwMS Spica is a Swedish torpedo boat from the 1960s that visitors can tour as a museum ship within the Vasa Museum. The vessel measures approximately 43 meters long and 7 meters wide, and was equipped with rapid-fire cannons and guided torpedoes for naval combat operations.
The ship was built in 1966 by the Götaverken shipyard and served the Swedish Navy for about two decades. After being retired in 1989, it was preserved and later converted into a museum display to document Sweden's naval history.
The vessel displays how Swedish Navy crews lived and worked during the Cold War era, with visible gun stations and cramped sleeping quarters that show daily routines onboard. The simple fittings give visitors a direct sense of the tight communal life sailors experienced.
Visitors can explore multiple decks of the vessel and look into the work areas where crew members operated during service. Sturdy footwear is recommended, as stairways are narrow and floors can become slippery in wet conditions.
The vessel used gas turbine engines, an advanced propulsion technology at the time that gave it unusually high speeds for a combat ship. This technology was uncommon in the Swedish Navy then and made the ship a technical innovator.
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