SS Palo Alto was a concrete ship built as a tanker at the end of World War I. Completed too late to see war service, she was mothballed until 1929, when she was intentionally grounded off Seacliff State Beach in the Monterey Bay, becoming part of a pleasure pier entertainment complex. Palo Alto was damaged by the sea, leading her to be stripped and used only as a fishing pier. Subsequent decades have seen her be further broken by the sea, but large sections of her wreck remain somewhat intact.
HistoryEdit
SS Palo Alto was built by the San Francisco Shipbuilding Company at the U.S. Naval Shipyard in Oakland, California. She was launched on 29 May 1919, too late to see service in the war.<ref name="FFS">Template:Cite book</ref> Her sister ship was the Template:SS.
Palo Alto was mothballed in Oakland until 1929, when she was bought by the Seacliff Amusement Corporation and towed to Seacliff State Beach in Aptos, California.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> A pier was built leading to the ship in 1930,<ref name="guarino20170123">Template:Cite newsTemplate:Cbignore</ref> and she was sunk in a few feet in the water so that her keel rested on the bottom. There she was refitted as an amusement ship, with amenities including a dance floor, a swimming pool and a café.<ref>deepgreen.com Seacliff State Beach USS Palo Alto</ref>
The company went bankrupt two years later during the Great Depression, and the ship cracked at the midsection during a winter storm. The State of California purchased the ship,<ref name=guarino20170123/> and she was stripped of her fittings and left as a fishing pier. She was a popular site for recreational fishing,<ref name=guarino20170123/> but eventually she deteriorated to the point where she was unsafe for this purpose, and she was closed to the public in 1950.<ref name=guarino20170123/> Following an attempt at restoration in the 1980s, she reopened for fishing for a few years, then closed again. The fishing pier opened to foot traffic once again in the summer of 2016, but later closed for repairs.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
Nicknamed the "Cement Ship",<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Palo Alto serves as an artificial reef for marine life. Pelicans and other seabirds perch on the wreck,<ref name=guarino20170123/> sea perch and other fish feed on algae that grow in the shelter of the wreck,<ref name=guarino20170123/> and sea lions and other marine mammals visit the wreck to feed on the fish.<ref name=guarino20170123/>
In the spring of 2005, oil found on wildlife nearly two years earlier, killing dozens of seabirds, was traced back to the ship, whose fuel tanks had cracked and were leaking fuel oil.<ref name=guarino20170123/> In September 2006, a clean-up project was started that cost an estimated $1.7 million,<ref name=guarino20170123/> approximately the same as the estimated $1.5 million cost of the original construction of the ship in 1919.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> During the clean-up, workers pumped 500 U.S. gallons (416 Imperial gallons; 1,893 liters) of oil from the ship and discovered the carcasses of 200 more birds and two harbor seals inside the wreck.<ref name=guarino20170123/>
The ship continued to deteriorate after the clean-up.<ref name=guarino20170123/> While she had over the decades been broken into four roughly segmented pieces, winter storms in February 2016 pushed the wreck onto her starboard side and broke her rear half open.<ref name=guarino20170123/> On 21 January 2017, another winter storm tore the stern off the ship.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref name=guarino20170123/> On 5 January 2023, yet another winter storm destroyed portions of the pier leading to the ship.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>