How many shipwrecks are at the bottom of Lake Michigan?

It is estimated that there are nearly 1,500 shipwrecks in Lake Michigan, which in its deepest spot is nearly 1,000 feet deep. While the remains of numerous ships can be found along the shoreline, only about 300 wrecks beyond the surf line have been located.



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It is estimated that there are nearly 1,500 shipwrecks in Lake Michigan, which in its deepest spot is nearly 1,000 feet deep. While the remains of numerous ships can be found along the shoreline, only about 300 wrecks beyond the surf line have been located.

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September 8, 2010 marked the 150th anniversary of the sinking of the Lady Elgin. The worst tragedy ever seen on the Great Lakes, this event looms large in Winnetka and Lake Michigan history. Just before midnight on September 7, 1860, a palatial sidewheel steamboat named the Lady Elgin left Chicago bound for Milwaukee.

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Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary protects a nationally significant collection of nearly 100 historic shipwrecks in Lake Huron off the Michigan coast. The site of the greatest number of Lake Huron shipwrecks.

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Of course, the most famous Great Lakes shipwreck was that of the Edmund Fitzgerald in 1975, with none of the 29 members of its crew surviving the waters of Lake Superior. And the most deadly event was the 1958 sinking of the Carl Bradley in Lake Michigan, claiming the lives of all but two of 35 shipmates onboard.

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Edmund Fitzgerald is among the largest and best-known vessels lost on the Great Lakes, but she is not alone on the Lake Superior seabed in that area. In the years between 1816, when Invincible was lost, and 1975, when Edmund Fitzgerald sank, the Whitefish Point area had claimed at least 240 ships.

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Lake Superior is the world's largest freshwater lake by area (31,700 mi2 /82,100 km2). It is also the coldest and deepest of the Great Lakes, with a maximum depth of 406 meters (1,332 feet). By most measures, it is the healthiest of all the Great Lakes.

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Edmund Fitzgerald, official number 277437, sinking in Lake Superior on 10 November 1975 with loss of life.” While the Coast Guard said the cause of the sinking could not be conclusively determined, it maintained that “the most probable cause of the sinking of the S.S.

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The waterway allows passage from the Atlantic Ocean to the inland port of Duluth on Lake Superior, a distance of 2,340 miles (3,770 km) and to Chicago, on Lake Michigan, at 2,250 miles (3,620 km).

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In 2007, a row of stones paralleling an ancient shoreline was discovered by Mark Holley, professor of underwater archeology at Northwestern Michigan College. This formation lies 40 feet (12 m) below the surface of the lake. One of the stones is said to have a carving resembling a mastodon.

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The lake's formation began 1.2 billion years ago when two tectonic plates moving in opposite directions left a giant scar—an event now known as the Midcontinent Rift. Less than 15,000 years ago, melting glaciers filled the giant basin, and Lake Michigan came to be. The lake's maximum depth is 925 feet.

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Lake Michigan has been responsible for around 45 percent of Great Lakes drownings this year, more than double the death toll of any other Great Lake, she continues.

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Lake Erie is the shallowest, warmest, and most productive of the Great Lakes. Three distinct basins provide a variety of offshore habitats. The Detroit River, Maumee River, and smaller tributaries drain into the western basin, which averages 24 feet deep and contains extremely nutrient-rich water.

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The oldest known shipwreck in Michigan is the Le Griffon, which is believed to have sunk in Lake Michigan in 1679. Michigan's shipwrecks are protected as publicly-owned resources. They are protected in 12 underwater preserves in order for divers and historians to gather information and complete research.

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