KEY LARGO, Florida Keys -- Rob Bleser's phone hasn't quit ringing and the e-mails are still coming.

First, after waves from Hurricane Dennis pushed the 510-foot U.S. Navy ship Spiegel Grove into an upright position in early July.

And lately, after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita brushed the Keys with strong tropical storm-force winds, callers want to know if the Spiegel Grove is still in the same upright position.

"The Spiegel's sitting solid the same way, said Bleser, project manager for the original sinking of the vessel. "She's just fine."

After more than three years resting on its starboard side, waves from Dennis pushed the 510-foot U.S. Navy ship Spiegel Grove into an upright position, before the hurricane brushed the Florida Keys July 9, leaving no significant lasting damage.

It's a position artificial reef project organizers have dreamed of since the retired 510-foot Navy Landing Ship Dock prematurely sunk and rolled over May 17, 2002, leaving the ship's upside-down bow protruding above the surface of the water.

Three weeks later, a salvage team managed to fully sink the vessel and it came to rest on its starboard side.

For more than three years, the Spiegel Grove has been the most popular artificial wreck in the Florida Keys and home to more than 160 different aquatic species, according to Lad Akins, executive director of the Reef Environmental Education Foundation.

According to Matt Strahan, meteorologist in charge at the National Weather Service Office in Key West, waves in the vicinity of the Spiegel Grove wreck site could have been has high as 20 feet by the afternoon of Friday, July 8.

"While we don't have the equipment in the Keys to accurately measure wave height, when Dennis was southeast of Cuba it would have produced very high waves that computer models project could have reached Key Largo," said Strahan. "Waves that high in close proximity to the reef can produce unusually strong currents with tremendous force."

Officials of the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary had called for divers to voluntarily refrain from diving the wreck until a stability analysis was undertaken and installation of new mooring buoys was completed.

"For the past three years, a northeast current flow has resulted in a dredging effect that dug a trench underneath and behind the starboard side of the ship," Bleser said. "The ship was anxious to roll.

"The ship is still positioned where it was, except it's now in an upright position, exactly how we originally planned it," he said. "In its upright orientation, one is overwhelmed by a feeling of its history, massive size and the ship's ability to continue making history."

The Spiegel Grove, the largest vessel intentionally sunk to make an artificial reef, is positioned in 130 feet of water about six miles off Key Largo. The ship was designed to carry cargo and craft for amphibious landings, and was retired by the Navy in 1989.

For complete info on the Spiegel Grove project click here.