Iconic 1000ft cruise ship left to rot will now be sunk in ambitious plan

An ocean liner which hosted Marilyn Monroe and Dwight Eisenhower will be purposefully sunk off the coast of Destin, Florida.

The plan was proposed by officials in Okaloosa County, Florida, who said sinking the SS United States could provide a home for marine life and attract divers from ‘around the world’.

But that’s if the ship can get there in one piece. The vessel, originally built in the 1950s, is worse for wear.

It once carried celebrities and politicians as the fastest cruise liner in the world, but has been sitting in a Philadelphia shipyard for years.

The ship will eventually find its permanent home below the waves in Florida, but the journey is proving to be complicated.

Recently released Coast Guard documents have revealed the ship might not be fit to make the journey.

They assessed the ship before its planned journey and found it ‘may not have suitable stability for the intended transit and presents a hazardous condition to the port and waterway’.

Before the ship can be moved and become an artificial reef in Florida, the Coast Guard said a report must be done on the ship’s structural condition, watertight integrity, towing condition, onboard liquid loading, centre of gravity and ability to traverse certain wave conditions.

It will likely be a few more years until the ship can be moved by a fleet of tug boats all the way to Florida.

However, using the sunken vessel as a haven for marine life could bring millions of dollars of tourism to the state.

Other shipwrecks have allowed marine life to flourish, including Sir Ernest Shackleton’s ‘Endurance’, at the bottom of the Antarctic.

Sea anemones, sponges and starfish now cover the wreck. A bright yellow sea lilly – another name for a group of invertebrate marine creatures called crinoids – was also spotted.

Artificial reefs have found great success in the past. They’ve been made of cinder blocks, wood, steel and other sunken objects.

In the Florida Keys, one ship was intentionally sunk in 1986 to help marine life thrive. The Thunderbolt is now rich with marine life.

Divers flock to it each year to see the coral and fish which swim around the new habitat.

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