1850
TROY (wooden side-wheel passenger/package freighter, 182 foot, 546 tons, built in 1845, at Maumee, Ohio) exploded and burned at Black Rock, New York. Up to 22 lives were lost. She was recovered and rebuilt the next year and lasted until 1860.
1886
Mr. D.N. Runnels purchased the tug KITTIE HAIGHT.
1964
The 3,280 ton motor vessel YANKCANUCK, commanded by Captain W. E. Dexter, docked at the Canadian Soo to officially open the 1964 navigation season for that port. Captain Dexter received the traditional silk hat from Harbormaster Frank Parr in a brief ceremony aboard the vessel. The ship arrived in the Sault from Windsor, Ontario. Captain Dexter said the trip from Windsor was uneventful and he had no trouble with ice. This was the first time a ship from the Yankcanuck line had won the honor of opening the Sault Harbor.
1978
The National Transportation Safety Board unanimously voted to reject the U. S. Coast Guard’s official report supporting the theory of faulty hatches in their EDMUND FITZGERALD investigation. Later the NTSB revised its verdict and reached a majority vote to agree that the sinking was caused by taking on water through one or more hatch covers damaged by the impact of heavy seas over her deck. This is contrary to the Lake Carriers Association’s contention that her foundering was caused by flooding through bottom and ballast tank damage resulting from bottoming on the Six Fathom Shoal between Caribou and Michipicoten Islands.
1986
EBN MAGID visited the Seaway in 1970 as a) ADEL WEERT WIARDS and was on the cover of Know Your Ships for 1971. Following 2 explosions and a fire at sea at the end of January, the vessel docked this day at Milford Haven, U.K. to be unloaded. It was then sold to Belgian shipbreakers.
2018
ALGOMA SAULT, Algoma Central Corp.’s second 740-foot-long Equinox-class self-unloading bulk carrier built at the Yangzijiang Shipyard in China, departed the anchorage on the Pacific Ocean side of the Panama Canal March 23, 2018, transited the canal overnight and cleared on Tuesday in the early morning. After clearing the Panama Canal, the ALGOMA SAULT headed to Montreal where it is expected March 31. The vessel is on its delivery voyage.
Contributors & Sources
Skip Gillham, Joe Barr, Dave Swayze, Father Dowling Collection, Ahoy & Farewell II, and the Great Lakes Ships We Remember” series.
