A NEW multimillion-pound museum, which will create the world's biggest memorial to the thousands of Commonwealth sailors killed in the line of duty, is to be built on the banks of the Clyde.
The proposed Scottish Submarine Centre, overlook ing the Firth of Clyde at Helensburgh, will be the only one its kind in the country and will also honour Scotland's role in the development of submarine technology.
Award-winning architect Gareth Hoskins, who designed the £47 million National Museum of Scotland redevelopment and the Culloden Battlefield Memorial Centre, has been asked to draw up plans for the £6m building.
Funding for the centre is being sought from a consortium of private and public bodies, with organisers claiming to have secured pledges of more than £1m so far.
An application for £240,000 will go before the Scottish Regional Armed Forces Community Covenant Awards Board later this month. It awards grants for projects that strengthen ties between military personnel and the communities in which they live and work.
Brian Keating, a Helensburgh-based businessman who is driving the project, said: "Helensburgh and the Clyde has been associated with the submarine service for more than 100 years.
"A lot of work was done here to pioneer the technology which may have started in submarines but has since been put to use in many other fields such as optics and communications.
"The Clyde has also played a major role as a home to submarines on active duty. Many of the most famous and daring missions carried out during the Second World War either began here or were in some way connected with the Clyde."
Already the Royal Navy Museum has agreed to donate an X51 class submarine as a centre piece of the state-of-the-art digital museum.
It is hoped the new facility will open by the end of 2016 in time for the 100th anniversary of the K13 disaster, in which 32 people died when a steam-driven submarine suffered a catastrophic failure during sea trials in the Gareloch near Helensburgh on January 29, 1917.
More than 5300 Commonwealth sailors have been killed in the line of duty and the new museum will commemorate their bravery.
Mr Keating said: "We want to create a world-class museum that celebrates the marine engineering heritage of the Clyde shipbuilders involved in the development of submarines and serves as a memorial to the brave men from all over the Commonwealth who served in the Silent Service.
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