A modern torpedo is an underwater ranged weapon launched above or below the water surface, self-propelled towards a target, with an explosive warhead designed to detonate either on contact with or in proximity to the target. It was called an automotive, locomotive or fish torpedo; the term torpedo was employed for a variety of devices, most of which would today be called mines. From about 1900, torpedo has been used to designate a self-propelled underwater explosive device. While the battleship had evolved around engagements between armored warships with large-calibre guns, the torpedo allowed small torpedo boats and other lighter surface vessels, submarines/submersibles improvised fishing boats or frogmen, light aircraft, to destroy large ships without the need of large guns, though sometimes at the risk of being hit by longer-range artillery fire. Modern torpedoes can be divided into heavyweight classes, they can be launched from a variety of platforms. The word torpedo comes from the name of a genus of electric rays in the order Torpediniformes, which in turn comes from the Latin torpere.

In naval usage, the American Robert Fulton introduced the name to refer to a towed gunpowder charge used by his French submarine Nautilus to demonstrate that it could sink warships. Torpedo-like weapons were first proposed many centuries before they were developed. For example, in 1275, Arab engineer Hasan al-Rammah – who worked as a military scientist for the Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt – wrote that it might be possible to create a projectile resembling "an egg", which propelled itself through water, whilst carrying "fire". In modern language, a "torpedo" is an underwater self-propelled explosive, but the term applied to primitive naval mines; these were used on an ad hoc basis during the early modern period up to the late 19th century. Early spar torpedoes were created by the Dutchman Cornelius Drebbel in the employ of King James I of England. An early submarine, attempted to lay a bomb with a timed fuse on the hull of HMS Eagle during the American Revolutionary War, but failed in the attempt.

In the early 1800s, the American inventor Robert Fulton, while in France, "conceived the idea of destroying ships by introducing floating mines under their bottoms in submarine boats". He coined the term "torpedo" in reference to the explosive charges with which he outfitted his submarine Nautilus. However, both the French and the Dutch governments were uninterested in the submarine. Fulton concentrated on developing the torpedo independent of a submarine deployment. On 15 October 1805, while in England, Fulton put on a public display of his "infernal machine", sinking the brig Dorothea with a submerged bomb filled with 180 lb of gunpowder and a clock set to explode in 18 minutes. However, the British government refused to purchase the invention, stating they did not wish to "introduce into naval warfare a system that would give great advantage to weaker maritime nations". Fulton carried out a similar demonstration for the US government on 20 July 1807, destroying a vessel in New York's harbor.

Further development languished as Fulton focused on his "steam-boat matters". During the War of 1812, torpedoes were employed in attempts to destroy British vessels and protect American harbors. In fact a submarine-deployed torpedo was used in an unsuccessful attempt to destroy HMS Ramillies while in New London's harbor; this prompted the British Captain Hardy to warn the Americans to cease efforts with the use of any "torpedo boat" in this "cruel and unheard-of warfare", or he would "order every house near the shore to be destroyed". Torpedoes were used by the Russian Empire during the Crimean War in 1855 against British warships in the Gulf of Finland, they used an early form of chemical detonator. During the American Civil War, the term torpedo was used for what is today called a contact mine, floating on or below the water surface using an air-filled demijohn or similar flotation device; these devices were primitive and apt to prematurely explode. They would be detonated on contact with the ship or after a set time, although electrical detonators were occasionally used.

USS Cairo was the first warship to be sunk in 1862 by an electrically-detonated mine. Spar torpedoes were used; these were used by the Confederate submarine H. L. Hunley to sink USS Housatonic although the weapon was apt to cause as much harm to its user as to its target. Rear Admiral David Farragut's famous/apocryphal command during the Battle of Mobile Bay in 1864, "Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!" Refers to a minefield laid at Alabama. On 26 May 1877, during the Romanian War of Independence, the Romanian spar torpedo boat Rândunica attacked and sank the Ottoman river monitor Seyfi; this was the first instance in history when a torpedo craft sank its targets without sinking. In 1866 British engineer Robert Whitehead invented the first effective self-propelled torpedo, the eponymous Whitehead torpedo. French and German inventions followed and the term torpedo came to describe self-propelled projectiles that traveled under or on water. By 1900, the term no longer included mines and booby-traps as the navies of the world added submarines, torpedo boats

Relentless Retribution is the sixth studio album by American thrash metal band, Death Angel. The album was released September 3, 2010, in Europe, on the September 6 in the United Kingdom, on September 14 in America. Track 2: "Claws In So Deep" features an acoustic part performed by Rodrigo y Gabriela; the album sold 2,700 copies in its first week in the U. S. All music is composed by Rob Cavestany. Death AngelMark Osegueda − lead vocals Rob Cavestany − lead guitar, backing vocals Ted Aguilar − rhythm guitar Damien Sisson − bass Will Carroll − drumsAdditional musiciansJason Suecof − guitar solos on "Truce" Rodrigo y Gabriela − acoustic guitar outro on "Claws in so Deep"

Luna E-6 No.8, sometimes identified by NASA as Luna 1965A, was a Soviet spacecraft, lost in a launch failure in 1965. It was a 1,422-kilogram Luna E-6 spacecraft, the seventh of twelve to be launched, It was intended to be the first spacecraft to perform a soft landing on the Moon, a goal which would be accomplished by the final E-6 spacecraft, Luna 9. Luna E-6 No.8 was launched on 10 April 1965, atop a Molniya-L 8K78L carrier rocket, flying from Site 1/5 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome. During third stage flight, a nitrogen pipeline in the oxidiser tank depressurised, which caused a loss of oxidiser flow to the engine and resulted in the engine cutting off; the spacecraft failed to achieve orbit, the spacecraft disintegrated on reentry. Prior to the release of information about its mission, NASA identified that it had been an attempt to land a spacecraft on the Moon. Zarya - Luna programme chronology