Scientists plan to sample water at 132 locations around the SS United States as the retired ocean liner becomes an artificial reef off Florida. The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution announced the study Wednesday, Nov. 11, the day Okaloosa County moved up the ship’s sinking. The researchers want to see which organisms arrive first and how changes in the water and steel shape what grows there later.
The 990-foot ship was chosen for a reef site about 22 nautical miles southwest of the Destin East Pass. The county bought the vessel in 2024. Edit USA’s earlier reporting traces how a passenger liner that once crossed the Atlantic in under four days came to be towed south for reef preparation. For the research team, the ship’s known deployment date offers something many historic wrecks cannot: a chance to make the first measurements before an established community takes over.
The first month sets the baseline
The Woods Hole research team plans to document the ship’s physical condition, the surrounding chemistry and the organisms present within the first month. That gives researchers a point of comparison for annual visits, when they plan to collect new samples and photograph the site. A change visible in a later picture can then be compared with what the team recorded when the reef was young. Without that early record, it is harder to tell how much happened before anyone arrived to look.
The water sampling has a separate purpose. Steel corrodes in seawater and can release iron, manganese and nickel. The team plans to measure those elements at its sampling locations and examine how concentrations vary around the hull. Some metals can act as nutrients for corals. The study is designed to test what role they play here, and the announcement gives no results from the new reef. A separate team led by University of Southern Mississippi microbiologist Leila Hamdan will sample sediment and water around the ship to examine what happens beyond the structure itself.
Before deployment, crews prepared the liner for use as a reef. Okaloosa County’s project FAQ describes the preparation and the federal and state guidance behind it. Woods Hole says its sampling will include selected elements and compounds alongside water chemistry, microbes and colonization. Those measurements serve a different purpose from the earlier cleanup. They track what changes after the hull reaches the seafloor.
How the liner compares with the Oriskany
The Gulf already has a large ship reef off Pensacola. The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission says the USS Oriskany went down in 2006 in about 212 feet of water, with its flight deck about 145 to 150 feet below the surface. The agency says storm activity and settling have changed some of its depths. Measurements taken soon after a ship is sunk describe its early position, which can shift over time.
The county’s plan for the United States put the seabed at about 180 feet, with the top deck expected to sit about 60 feet below the surface, according to pre-deployment reporting on the project. Those were projected depths. Divers planning a trip need current conditions and measured depths for the specific part of the wreck they want to visit. A deck and a lower section of the same ship can require very different training and equipment.
Woods Hole biologist Kirstin Meyer-Kaiser says the team hopes to work with Destin-Fort Walton Beach on a program that would let recreational divers contribute photographs between annual research visits. The announcement gives no start date or submission process. For now, the work begins with the scientists’ early record of the hull, surrounding water and first organisms to appear.
