A PORTLAND museum designed to plunge people into the sights, sounds, atmosphere and experience of D-Day on the island is ready for its first visitors.

From the slipways and piers of Castletown the men, vehicles and equipment of the fifth US Corps and US first division embarked on to the vast number of ships and landing crafts that would carry them from south coast of England to the invasion beaches of Normandy.

The Castletown D-Day Centre is a new visitor attraction that offers an immersive visitor experience, telling the story of embarkation from a busy wartime dockyard.

Built over two levels the visitor enters into a dockside seen where men and equipment are being loaded onto a landing ship that is moored alongside the dock.

The centre also features WWII era military vehicles, a fullized replica Mk IX Spitfire and an original Sherman M4A4 tank

The museum is located in the former Admiralty Buildings.

Derek Luckhurst, owner of care provider AginCare, is behind the Castletown revival project.

Mr Luckhurst alongside Portland's own D-Day veteran, Richard Philips marked the completion of the museum with a ribbon-cutting ceremony yesterday.

Mr Philips said he was "honoured" to declare the museum open.

Mr Luckhurst thanked all the dedicated volunteers and businesses that had supported the museum such as BT Graphics, Print Team and SMCC.

Mr Luckhurst gave a special thanks to curator of the museum, Stephen George.

He said: "I want to give a big thank you to Stephen. He has worked tirelessly on this project.

"He originally contacted me to say he had a great idea for Castletown - and what a wonderful idea it was.

"He has put in hours and hours of work for this community."

Tomorrow will see a parade of more than 50 American GI’s and 20 D-Day vehicles, including Jeeps, dodge weapons carriers, GMC trucks, motorcycles, artillery pieces and Half-tracks, through Castletown from 12.30pm before assembling at the museum which is being opened to the public for the very first time at 1pm.

The museum has now been sub-contracted to D-Day Dorset Limited, owned by Mr George.

Mr George said he was "ecstatic" to see the museum open.

He said: "One of our most valuable and rare pieces is a medic's helmet that would have seen the worst you could imagine. It would have been worn on Omaha Beach. It is a really rare find and was donated to us from one of our volunteers."

For more information visit castletownddaycentre.com