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The remarkably intact wreck of a schooner that sank in 1891
has been discovered in Lake Michigan.
Shipwreck hunter Ross Richardson was traveling to South
Manitou Island in northern Lake Michigan when his sonar picked up “something
interesting” on the lakebed. Richardson made a record of the GPS coordinates
and returned about a week later for a closer inspection. “The sonar showed
something rising 90 feet off the bottom, which is very unusual,” he
said.
Resting in 300 feet of water, the mysterious object was beyond Richardson’s
diving range so he called in his friend Steve Wimer, a diver and underwater
photographer, to examine the wreck site. On Sept. 30, Richardson, Wimer and
their friend Brent Tompkins returned to the site and Wimer swam down to
photograph what the website describes as a “mysterious ghost ship.”
Wimer described what he found on the lakebed as “the most intact shipwreck I have ever encountered,” The wreck was a small two-masted schooner, about 60 or 70 feet in length, with a lifeboat at its stern.
Eerie footage of the wreck shown below (click "video") shows the ship in its final resting place, with its masts clearly still intact. The ship’s deck, hull and stern cabin can also be seen, as well as its lifeboat.
video
The presence of iron rope offered a vital clue as to the ship’s identity, as was the schooner’s “sleek clipper bow.” Iron rope wasn’t widely used until the 1870s and the bow was typical of schooners built in Manitowoc and, later, Milwaukee, according to Richardson’s website.
MLive reports that the schooner, which was built in Manitowoc, Wis., in 1888, was lost in a gale with four people aboard.
The Great Lakes continue to reveal their shipwreck secrets. Two Civil War-era schooners that collided and sank more than 140 years ago were recently discovered near Beaver Island in northern Lake Michigan
The wreck of a steamer has also been
discovered 103 years after it was struck by a massive wave
and sank in Lake Superior. Earlier this year, the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum
announced the discovery of the wreck of the S.R. Kirby off the Keweenaw
Peninsula on Michigan’s Upper Peninsula.
Researchers found what appeared to
be wreckage near Eagle Harbor, Mich., in 2018 and returned to identify the
wreck with an underwater drone this year. That same year, experts said
that a shipwreck discovered in Lake Erie in 2015 may be the oldest found in
the famous lake.
Also in 2018, researchers announced the discovery
of the 119-year-old shipwreck Margaret Olwill at the bottom of Lake Erie. The
wooden steam barge sank during an 1899 nor’easter.In May 2008, two explorers discovered the British warship HMS Ontario, which was lost in Lake Ontario in 1780. The Ontario is the oldest shipwreck ever found in the Great Lakes and the only British warship of this period still in existence in the world.
Later that year, the explorers - Jim Kennard and Dan Scoville, also discovered a rare 19th-century schooner sitting upright 500 feet under the waves of Lake Ontario.
In 2016, Kennard was also part of a team of underwater explorers that discovered the second-oldest confirmed shipwreck in the Great Lakes. The Washington, an American-built, Canadian-owned sloop sank in Lake Ontario during a fierce storm in 1803.
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Apparently, Lake Michigan is a wreck-divers dream with new sites being found with some regularity.
Until next time,
Fair Winds,
Old Salt
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