It is understood a proposed new site will not have space for one of the trust's main exhibits, U-boat U534, which currently stands on what will be the car park for the residential development. The U-boat is owned by a Danish company which retrieved it from the sea-bed between Sweden and Denmark where it had been since being sunk in World War II. Its owners, Den Bla Avis, may be forced to return it to Denmark unless a new home can be found quickly. Last night a trust spokesman said: "This will be a great loss to our collection and destroys the potential for an international Battle of the Atlantic exhibition with HMS Whimbrel and Western Approaches bunker in Derby House, Liverpool." The collection was described by Holiday Which in 2004 as one of the most enjoyable maritime sites its assessors had ever visited. The trust is home to Britain's only Falklands Conflict memorial but this will also be dismantled, just one year before the 25th commemoration of the war in 1982. Last Friday the trust's board decided to put Warship Preservation Trust into voluntary liquidation, brought about by several factors, most crucially because it does not have a new home or agreement to go onto a new site from March 1. The move has been made necessary because of the redevelopment of the adjacent listed corn warehouses as apartments. When the trust first arrived in 1992 the MDHC insisted on a legal lease being signed with the council. Under the terms of the lease MDHC were legally entitled to terminate the agreement with six months' notice.. Historic Warships is self-funding, with its only funds coming from admission and shop sales and the generosity of chairman the ex-MP Sir Philip Goodhart who has underwritten any shortfall since 1992. Wirral Council's head of regeneration, David Ball, said last night: "We are trying to contact the Warships Preservation Trust." A spokesman for MDHC said: "We have offered an alternative location to Wirral Borough Council, further down the same quay." larryneild@dailypost.co.uk Losing these precious jewels in our maritime heritage crown would be nothing short of sheer madness
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