46-years ago today, the SS Edmund Fitzgerald sunk while traveling on Lake Superior.
The vessel is the largest to have sunk in any of the great lakes, taking with her the entire crew of 29 men and her cargo of ore pellets.
Captain Ernest M. McSorley and his crew departed from Superior Wisconsin the afternoon of November 9th, en route to a steel mill near Detroit.
She would not make it.
The Edmund Fitzgerald and the SS Arthur M. Anderson were caught in a severe storm that carried with-it hurricane-force winds, and waves of up to 35 feet high.
Just after 7:10 PM, the ship submerged under the Lake Superior waters, about 17 miles from Whitefish Bay.
The story was immortalized in song by Gordon Lightfoot, who released “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” one year after the sinking of the 729-foot ship.
The tragedy led to several changes to shipping law on the Great Lakes.