The SS United States, the former luxury ocean liner that was parked in South Philadelphia for almost 30 years, has reached Mobile, Ala., faster than expected and in one piece, proving the skeptics wrong.

The luxury liner SS United States completed its journey Monday from South Philadelphia to Alabama, where it will undergo preparations before it is sunk in the waters off Florida's Gulf Coast to become an artificial reef.

Okaloosa County commissioners voted in October to buy the SS United States for $10 million and use it as an artificial reef. It’s estimated that the economic benefit will be $3 million a