World's Rarest Dodge Viper Is a Lucky Prototype That Should Have Been Destroyed Years Ago

There are many reasons for that. For starters, the Viper looked stunning thanks to its muscular styling cues and decidedly long engine hood. Second, it had a V10 engine, a feature no other American carmaker offered at the time. Rated at 400 horsepower at the time of its introduction, it had enough oomph to give the mighty Corvette C4 ZR-1 a run for its money.

As the Viper evolved throughout the years, the V10 became increasingly larger and more powerful. When Dodge pulled the plug in 2017, the 8.4-liter behemoth delivered a whopping 645 horsepower. I should also mention that just like the Corvette, the Viper spawned track-ready sports cars and highly successful race-spec versions.

But I'm not here to talk about the final and more extreme iterations of Dodge's V10-powered beast. I'm here to introduce you to a very special prototype that might just be the world's rarest Viper.

The red RT/10 you see here may look like a regular first-generation Viper, but it is, in fact, part of an early run of 10 vehicles that Dodge used to evaluate production methods. Some of these cars were also sent to dealerships to get the hype going before the sports car went on sale in January 1992.

Serial number 00005, this RT/10 is one of only a few pilot cars that still exist. Like most pre-production prototypes, which are illegal to drive on public roads, this Viper was scheduled to be destroyed. However, Dodge had a change of heart and opted to gift the roadster to the Petersen Automotive Museum. Some 30 years later, and the prototype is still alive and kicking, and thanks to the museum's "Pit Stops" YouTube series, we can take a closer look at it.

Sure, the car looks identical to its regular-production counterparts (down to the 400-horsepower V10 engine), but it's downright fantastic that it soldiered on for more than 30 years without meeting the crusher. What's more, the RT/10 appears to be in fabulous condition, looking just as good as it did when it left the factory back in the early 1990s.

But while it's cool to see this prototype, it reminds me of that time when Chrysler hunted down and destroyed no fewer than 93 Vipers. It happened in 2014, when the company retrieved pre-production examples it had previously donated to trade schools for educational purposes.

Footage of early 1990s Vipers being crushed in junkyards made headlines and angered car enthusiasts, but it didn't stop Chrysler from turning them into piles of metal and fiberglass. The crushing campaign also included the fourth Viper ever produced, which was evaluated at around $250,000 in 2014 (that's about $317,000 as of early 2023).

Miraculously enough, the prototype donated to the Petersen museum was allowed to live on, and you can check it out in the video below.