SS United States sunk off Florida to become world's largest artificial reef

The SS United States, the fastest ocean liner ever to cross the Atlantic, was deliberately sunk in the Gulf of Mexico on Wednesday 11 November 2026, about 22 nautical miles southwest of Destin-Fort Walton Beach in the Florida Panhandle. Okaloosa County, which bought the ship in 2024, says the 990-foot (302-metre) vessel is now the world's largest artificial reef, overtaking the aircraft carrier USS Oriskany, sunk off Pensacola in 2006.

Crews flooded the ship over several hours rather than using explosives, and the last of the liner slipped beneath the surface at around 9 p.m. Central Time (10 p.m. Eastern), according to local public radio station WUWF, Fox Weather and Axios. That was about 8 a.m. on Thursday in Pakistan and 3 a.m. on Thursday in London. The county had planned the sinking for Thursday but brought it forward a day because of a forecast of strong winds.

How was the SS United States sunk?

No explosives were used. Okaloosa County spokesperson Nick Tomecek told Baird Maritime that federal environmental and explosives rules ruled them out. Instead, contractors spent more than a year preparing the ship in Mobile, Alabama: they removed hazardous materials, cleaned all 128 fuel tanks, took out more than 400 portholes and many interior doors, and cut openings through the decks and hull so that water could get in and air could escape, according to Baird Maritime and Delaware Online.

On the day, crews began the deployment in the early afternoon local time. Fox Weather reported that a fireboat pumped seawater in through a hose, and that officials later opened two valves so the sea could flow in through the ship's original intake pipes. Baird Maritime said the liner was described as fully flooded by late afternoon but had not yet settled. Accounts of how long the final stage took differ, from about four hours to more than five, and WUWF said the whole process ran about eight hours longer than expected. NPR reported that the ship's final moments came quickly, with the hull tilting onto its side as it dipped below the waves.

Tomecek told Fox Weather that the operation needed sustained winds below 17 mph and waves under 3 feet, because the wind could push a vessel of this size off its permitted site. The US Coast Guard kept other boats at least one nautical mile away during the sinking.

Why is the SS United States so famous?

The liner was designed by the American naval architect William Francis Gibbs and built in Newport News, Virginia, where it was launched on 23 June 1951. On its maiden voyage in July 1952 it crossed the Atlantic in about 3 days and 10 hours, winning the Blue Riband, the informal title for the fastest regular passenger crossing. That record for an ocean liner has never been beaten.

The ship was also a Cold War project. The SS United States Conservancy, the nonprofit that owned it from 2011 until 2024, says the US government helped fund it so that it could be converted into a troop carrier able to move about 14,000 service members 10,000 miles without refuelling. Over 17 years in service it carried more than a million passengers, according to the conservancy, including four US presidents, film stars and, on one trip, the Mona Lisa.

The rise of jet travel ended its career. The ship was withdrawn from service in 1969, passed through a series of owners and had its interiors auctioned off and stripped. From 1996 it sat at a pier on the Delaware River in Philadelphia, where plans to turn it into a hotel, casino or restaurant all failed because of cost, Axios reported.

How did a Florida county end up owning it?

In 2024 the ship was evicted from its Philadelphia pier after a rent dispute. Because no other home for it could be found, the conservancy sold it to Okaloosa County for $1 million. Susan Gibbs, the conservancy's head and granddaughter of the ship's designer, told NPR she felt "a complex mix of sorrow but gratitude and pride and hope", and said the group saw reefing as "by far the more dignified solution" than a scrapyard. The ship was towed out of Philadelphia in February 2025.

Its famous red, white and blue funnels, the radar mast and one of its five-bladed propellers were removed before the sinking and are due to go into a land-based museum in the area, according to Axios and conservancy board member Warren Jones, speaking to Fox Weather.