Yet another Great Lakes wreck discovery has been made in the form of the steel bulk cargo ship Huronton, which sank almost exactly a century ago.
The ship is beyond normal diving depths, however, sitting 240m deep in Lake Superior on the US-Canadian border.
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The discovery is another achievement for the Michigan-based Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society (GLSHS).
The wreck was found in August as the research vessel David Boyd deployed the GLSHS’s sonar-scanning towfish, with footage then captured using an ROV, but the society delayed the announcement until the anniversary of the sinking.
The 73m Huronton had been built in Ohio in 1898 but was based in Canada with Matthews Steamship Co. On 11 October, 1923, she was travelling unladen north-west with heavy fog and forest-fire smoke drifting across the lake when she collided with a bigger ship heading in the opposite direction, the ore-laden 125m Cetus.
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Moving too fast
Both vessels were reported to have been moving too fast for the low-visibility conditions. The bow of the Cetus ripped a huge hole towards the bow in the port side of the Huronton, “momentarily locking the two ships together”, says the GLSHS.
Cetus’s captain had the presence of mind to keep his engines running, which effectively plugged the hole to give Huronton’s crew time to either scramble onto the Cetus or launch their lifeboats.
Huronton’s first mate Dick Simpell then jumped back onto his ship and ran to the flooding stern section to untie the ship’s mascot. He succeeding in rescuing the bulldog before the vessel sank, 18 minutes after the collision.
The wreck-site turned out to be 23 miles north-west of Whitefish Point, where the GLSHS’s Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum is located.
As the lake depth dropped from 90m to indicate a “small hole” at 240m, it became necessary to let out a lot more cable or slow down, said director of marine operations Darryl Ertel of the search for the Huronton.
“There was a little sliver in there that was a straight line, but it looked like the size of a thread. And because it was a straight line, I marked it as a possible target. Four hours later we come back on our way home to check it. And, sure enough, it was a shipwreck.”
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