A BLACK Country company has reached a major milestone in an engineering project which is believed to be unique.

TM Specialist Engineers, based at Oak Lane in Kingswinford, completed the trial assembly of a 60 tonne crane which will be used to defuel nuclear submarines.

The £1.5m crane, which is ten metres long, ten metres high and five metres wide, will eventually be installed at Devonport Royal Dockyard in Plymouth where it will be put to work on decommisioned Swiftsure and Trafalgar class subs.

Richard Holland, sales manager at the family-run engineering company, said: "You would struggle to find another one in the world. It’s structure and design are of the highest levels of quality - in engineering standards the process was incredibly challenging."

The two year construction process required 8,000 hours of welding to create five sections which will be disassembled and transported to the south coast after rigorous testing.

Each weld is inspected to ensure it has been finished to the highest industry standards.

The crane will be fitted with components including gearboxes and braking systems before transportation to 14 Dock at Devonport.

It will be mounted on rails within a Reactor Access House which will be placed over the submarine's reactor compartment to provide a platform for the safe removal of nuclear fuel.