Turbine waterwheels. Gas, steam, and water turbines have a casing around the blades that contains and controls the working fluid. Credit for invention of the steam turbine is given both to Anglo-Irish engineer Sir Charles Parsons (1854–1931) for invention of the reaction turbine, and to Swedish engineer Gustaf de Laval (1845–1913) for invention of the impulse turbine. Modern steam turbines frequently employ both reaction and impulse in the same unit, typically varying the degree of reaction and impulse from the blade root to its periphery. The word "turbine" was coined in 1822 by the French mining engineer Claude Burdin from the
Gas turbine by a gas turbine. The "Auris" operated commercially as a tanker for three-and-a-half years with a diesel-electric propulsion unit as originally commissioned, but in 1951 one of its four diesel engines – which were known as "Faith", "Hope", "Charity" and "Prudence" - was replaced by the world’s first marine gas turbine engine, a open-cycle gas turbo-alternator built by British Thompson-Houston Company in Rugby. Following successful sea trials off the Northumbrian coast, the "Auris" set sail from Hebburn-on-Tyne in October 1951 bound for Port Arthur in the US and then Curacao in the southern Caribbean returning to Avonmouth after 44 days