Museum working hard to secure transfer of sub

Cold War-era sub expected to arrive in September

Canada's Cold War-era HMCS Ojibwa submarine is scheduled to tie up at Port Burwell in September but Elgin Military Museum executive director Ian Raven cautions there's still a massive amount of work to do.

"It's an order of magnitude more than the museum's ever taken on before but with the companies we're dealing with, we're very confident we can do it," he said Friday.

"There's a tremendous return and everything that we have says it's going to work but, until it's actually sitting on the cradles, we're going to be concerned."

In August, the museum wasn't even sure the Ojibwa wasn't destined for the scrap-yard, instead, as the Department of National Defence hadn't given the museum permission to take ownership of the sub.

Staff, however, received approval in principal in November on a condition they scheduled the work and satisfied all the engineering and technical requirements.

In early May, crews are to load the submarine onto a floating dry-dock in its current Halifax home and tow it up the St. Lawrence River to Lake Ontario and, eventually, to Hamilton.

In Hamilton, the sub will be transferred to a smaller barge and mounted on permanent cradles.

It will transit the Welland Canal to Lake Erie and eventually dock in Port Burwell where a foundation will have been constructed. Heavy lift specialists will hoist the Ojibwa to its permanent home.

Secured project funding is also required as part of the final approval, something Raven says they're working hard to oblige with.

The museum was approved for a federal grant of $1.9 million through the Community Adjustment Fund. At the time, however, there was a stipulation the project would be done by March, 2011. That didn't happen and the deadline was pushed back until October 2011. But the Department of National Defense still hadn't approved the submarine's relocation.

Raven says the museum is waiting on word from the federal government as to whether they'll still get the money.

 "We haven't received any definitive word one way or the other. We are hopeful that they will find a way because, realistically, it was matters beyond our control that prevented it from happening," he adds.

"We're hopeful that they'll find some way to let us continue to access those funds."

But even if the federal grant falls through, Raven says there are other funding channels the museum can explore although he wouldn't say how much of which the museum has raised due to ongoing discussions with some parties.

"Everybody is pushing this as hard as they can. I don't think there's a tremendous likelihood that we're going to have a problem but you never know."

Part of the reason Raven says he doesn't anticipate a problem is the economic impact the project will have on the area. For instance, a consultant company commissioned by the Municipality of Bayham undertook a land-use planning study in 2011 that projected the Ojibwa would generate $14 million in extra revenue for the area.

Raven adds he agrees with the report's conclusions and says he expects a large amount of visitors at the port on Sept. 8.

"I think there will be huge crowd there that day. I would be very surprised if there wasn't," he said.

"Where else are you going to see an event of that nature?"