The USA’s Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society (GLSHS) often chooses anniversary dates to announce its discovery of missing ships, and the steamer Adella Shores is the latest example, because the vessel was built 130 and sank 115 years ago in icy Lake Superior, on 1 May, 1909.
The 60m ship was never seen again after departing for Duluth laden with salt, and there were no survivors or witnesses to the sinking, so it was recorded as “Went Missing”. Members of the society have located the wreck just short of 200m deep, 65km north-west of Whitefish Point, Michigan, where they are based.
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The timber steamship had been built in the state in 1894 and was owned by the Shores Lumber Co, which had named her after the owner’s daughter.
Adella’s sister Bessie had launched the ship using a bottle of water rather than champagne or wine because the family was temperate – and that had been regarded by some as a bad omen.
Three sinkings
The Adella Shores in fact sank twice in shallow water and was refloated before her final sinking. A larger steel ship, the Daniel J Morrell, had been steaming more than 3km ahead, ploughing a path through thick ice-floes, before both vessels encountered a fierce north-easterly gale as they rounded Whitefish Point.
The Adella Shores was lost with all 14 crew, and only some debris was ever found afterwards. The ship had been out of the sight of the Morrell, but that ship’s captain expressed his view that she had punctured her hull on the ice-floe, and would have sunk quickly as a result.
GLSHS director of marine operations Darryl Ertel and his brother Dan had been towing the society’s Marine Sonic Technology side-scan sonar system when they found the mark back in the summer of 2021.
“I pretty much knew that had to be the Adella Shores when I measured the length of it, because there were no other ships out there missing in that size range,” said Ertel.
“As soon as I put the ROV down on it for the first time, I could see the design of the ship and I could match it right up to the Adella Shores.”
The GLSHS was founded by a group of divers and educators in 1978 to explore historic shipwrecks in eastern Lake Superior, and each summer opens the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum at two sites, at Whitefish Point and Sault Sainte Marie.
“Every one of these stories is important and deserves to be told with the utmost honour and respect,” commented the society’s content/communications director Corey Adkins, addressing the question of the time-lag before announcing the find. “GLSHS has had some banner years of discovery.” Divernet coverage of some of the society’s other recent lake discoveries can be found below.
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