Follow-Up: SS United States Sinks Off Florida to Become the World's Largest Artificial Reef

The deliberate sinking of the SS United States off Florida is complete, according to live on-scene reporting by the Pensacola News Journal on the night of November 11: the 990-foot liner, deployed by Florida's Okaloosa County, sank at 9 p.m. CT on November 11 in the Gulf about 22 nautical miles southwest of Destin-Fort Walton Beach, becoming the world's largest artificial reef.

The live record shows crews first opened two valves to flood the hull, with the county confirming at 3:50 p.m. CT that the final descent process had started; all valves were then opened and personnel left the ship. The descent was slower than expected, and Reuters reported from the scene that most of the hull was still above the surface at sunset. In an update timestamped 10:05 p.m. ET, reporter Lisa Nellessen Savage wrote that the ship sank at 9 p.m. CT, leaning to one side in her final moments before going down within minutes.

The site is about 32 nautical miles southeast of Pensacola Pass, at proposed coordinates of 30°07.148′ N, 86°46.755′ W, with the actual resting position to be fixed by a post-deployment survey. The water is about 180 feet deep and the upper decks are expected to sit about 60 feet below the surface. Dive teams associated with Destin-Fort Walton Beach and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution will make the first survey dive, with the findings provided to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers; if the survey goes as planned, recreational divers are expected to be able to visit from dawn on November 12, and officials advised waiting for an official announcement.

Preparing the liner as a reef took months of work in Mobile, Alabama: her two 65-foot red, white and blue smokestacks were lifted off and preserved for a future land-based museum, hazardous materials were stripped out, all 128 fuel tanks were scrubbed clean, hundreds of portholes and interior doors were removed so divers can explore safely, and openings were cut in the hull to let air escape as water entered, keeping the descent level.

The SS United States set the transatlantic speed record on her 1952 maiden voyage, a record that still stands, and at 990 feet she is more than 100 feet longer than the RMS Titanic. Okaloosa County bought the ship in October 2024 for $10.1 million; she had been moored in Philadelphia for nearly 30 years before being towed to Mobile for environmental remediation. The sinking was moved up a day because of expected bad weather, and a federal judge, M. Casey Rodgers, denied a preservation group's bid to halt it on November 6. GSM reported the start of flooding operations and the beginning of the final descent earlier in the day; this story covers the completion of the same event.

Source: Okaloosa County

Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)

Photo: 图：合众国号邮轮停泊期间的船首航拍照片（资料照片）。照片：Chuck Homler d/b/a FocusOnWildlife，CC BY-SA 4.0，经 Wikimedia Commons。 / File photo: Aerial view of the bow of SS United States while moored. Photo: Chuck Homler d/b/a FocusOnWildlife, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

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