New Clues to the Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald

LiveScience via Yahoo ^ | 5/19/06 | Robert Roy Britt

[ZGuy]

Weather experts have "hindcasted" the storm that sunk the Edmund Fitzgerald on Lake Superior during the November 1975.

Hurricane-force gusts and waves coming from an unexpected angle likely contributed to the disaster immortalized by Gordon Lightfoot in the song, "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald," researchers say.

All 29 crewmembers died.

"During the late afternoon and early evening of Nov. 10, conditions deteriorated rapidly with winds in excess of 69 mph, hurricane-force gusts [over 74 mph] and waves more than 25 feet high," said Thomas Hultquist, science and operations officer at the NOAA National Weather Service forecast office in Negaunee, Mich.

The freighter, thought like the Titanic to be invincible, was heading south. Waves were traveling west-to-east, the new analysis shows. This could have created a hazardous rolling motion. The ship sank about 15 miles from Whitefish Bay.

Lake Superior is the largest of the Great Lakes.

"While high winds on Lake Superior are not rare, it is unusual for the waves to get that high on the lake," said Schwab. "It's unlikely that Captain Ernest McSorley, the skipper of the Edmund Fitzgerald, had ever seen anything like that in his career."

The findings are detailed in the May issue of the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society.

[onyx]

I am going to have to bookmark this thread because I am getting confused...lol.

The SOO LOCKS are in Sault St Marie?

[Spruce]

Did you manage to see the iron mines? You should see what it takes to fill them big boats. Hibbing is the home of 'The largest man-made hole on the planet'.

[Indy Pendance]

I never knew that about Lake St. Clair. I thought that was North Twin Lake, Vilas County, Wisconsin had the best muskie fishing.

link to map

[Westlander]

Should we tell Onyx it's 5 miles long? :-)
http://www.epa.gov/glnpo/image/vbig/369.jpg

[Indy Pendance]

Wisconsin. I'm north and east of a little city, West Bend, about 40 miles north of Milwaukee, about 10 miles west of Port Washington.

[Rte66]

"T'was the witch of November come stealing ..."

.On November 13, 1913, a single storm sank 12 ships and killed 250+ people
.The great blizzard of November 11, 1940 sank two ships and killed 46 people.
.The Edmund Fitzgerald went down on November 10, 1975, killing all 29 people onboard.

That's about 350 people lost to the Witch right there. Most all the articles about the Great Lakes shipwrecks say November is the worst month for fatalities.

[onyx]

I am planning my trip! I love finding beautiful rocks and shells.

 

LAKE SUPERIOR Did you know?

• Lake Superior is the largest of the Great Lakes. It's so big that it could hold all of the water in the other Great Lakes plus three more the size of Lake Erie.
• Most of the world's water sources lie in lowlands but the Great Lakes are high or tall. We measure this by saying places are so many feet above sea level. Lake Superior is about 600 feet above, making it the highest of the Great Lakes.
• Lake Superior is the deepest of the Great Lakes going down as far as 1,332 feet. That's what makes it the coldest of the Great Lakes too!
• Each year a small amount of water travels out of the lake and it takes about 200 years for this water to be replaced.
• On the southwestern tip of Lake Superior lies the city of Duluth which is the only international port that is located so deep within the United States borders.
• Inland cities like Hibbing mine taconite and send it by rail to the port of Duluth where ore boats carry it to various places around the world. Taconite is a mineral that is used to produce steel.
• The shoreline of Lake Superior is often very rocky and on its beaches one can often find beautiful agates which were dropped there during the glacier retreat.
  

[Indy Pendance]

That bridge is one of the scariest to drive over. There's even employees that will drive you across if you can't do it. If you're rich, you have to stay on Mackinac Island, no cars are alowed on the island, but fancy.....We were going to go there on our honeymoon, but ended up doing something different.

Link

This is the famous hotel, where all the stars and gansters used to go.

Grand Hotel

If you make the trip, let me know!

[Indy Pendance]

Wisconsin is beautiful. But, most parts of the US are.

[onyx]

Should we tell Onyx it's 5 miles long? :-)

Nah, don't tell onyx! Let her continue to think she knows everything...lol.

[Indy Pendance]

Yes, and Sault is pronounced SOO (Sue)

[onyx]

WOW! HUGE bridge. I love that pic. I am so glad I have bookmarked this thread. Guess what husband is going to be shown first thing in the morning?

[Indy Pendance]

LOL! Did you ever see the History Channel's making of the bridge? If you happen to catch it, it's really interesting.

[onyx]

Oh my goodness. The Grand Hotel!
Thank you for the links.

[Al Simmons]

A recent show on either the History Channel or Discovery about "Rogue Waves" that suddenly appear, 3 times higher than any other wave in the storm (up to a 100 feet high have been documented), might have been what did the "Edmund Fitzgerald" in....certainly a wave that size could have lifted enough of the ship out of the water to break her in half easily...

[onyx]

I am taking the virtual tour of the Grand Hotel as I am typing this! I hope they're not showing me the $650 per night accommodations. :)

[Spruce]

It's the Twisting that does these ships in.

One of my best friends was a laborer on an ore ship. When he saw The Lake twist a 5+ ton hatch off an ore-carrier, he knew that job was not for him.

[onyx]

This has been a delightful night.
Thanks everybody. I need to sneak upstairs into bed.

[Dolphy]

Yes, we saw the iron mines along with several copper mines. The iron mines are staggering...I was going to say it was like going back to another century in some of those places, but since it's 2006, I guess the whole vacation was in another century :)

[Dolphy]

Night, Onyx.