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These Men dove to the Edmund Fitzgerald shipwreck decades ago. Their stories

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Re: These Men dove to the Edmund Fitzgerald shipwreck decades ago. Their stories

#11

The wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald is located at a depth of 530 feet (162 meters) below the surface of Lake Superior. That's an extremely risky technical deep dive. There were probably more people in space than non-saturation diving at this depth.

500-foot waters but the ship was 700+ long. The size of cargo ships boggles the mind. The largest space rockets are toys compared to any modern cargo ship.

Re: These Men dove to the Edmund Fitzgerald shipwreck decades ago. Their stories

#12
post #9

I lived on an Island in Lake Huron for about 5 years and went visiting the Lake Superior area many times. To call it a lake does not really do it justice: it's an inland sea, and a most impressive one. I've seen the lake from the shore in more than one storm and it didn't look any different than the ocean, except that it seemed in many ways more violent. I asked the locals about it and they said that the lake is more…

Thanks for that, super interesting about sieches. A standing wave not directly from the moon or waves.From the wiki: Lake seiches can occur very quickly: on July 13, 1995, a large seiche on Lake Superior caused the water level to fall and then rise again by one metre (three feet) within fifteen minutes, leaving some boats hanging from the docks on their mooring lines when the water retreated

In Chicago I’ve observed and measured a consistent 0.8kn (1.48 km/hr) current set flowing north after a long week of consistent breezes out of the north. The water just piles up in the shallow end of the lake and when the breeze dies that water needs to go somewhere.

Lake Michigan has the least turnover of all the lakes and when thinking about predicting current on it it’s good to imagine a 300 mile long bathtub.

Re: These Men dove to the Edmund Fitzgerald shipwreck decades ago. Their stories

#13

The ship was the pride of the American side Coming back from some mill in Wisconsin As the big freighters go, it was bigger than most With a crew and good captain well seasoned Concluding some terms with a couple of steel firms When they left fully loaded for Cleveland And later that night when the ship's bell rang Could it be the north wind they'd been feeling? The wind in the wires made a tattle-tale sound And a wa…

It's poetry, not code, but I've formatted it as code for line breaks:

  The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
  Of the big lake they called Gitche Gumee
  The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead
  When the skies of November turn gloomy

  With a load of iron ore twenty-six thousand tons more
  Than the Edmund Fitzgerald weighed empty
  That good ship and true was a bone to be chewed
  When the gales of November came early
  
  The ship was the pride of the American side
  Coming back from some mill in Wisconsin
  As the big freighters go, it was bigger than most
  With a crew and good captain well seasoned
  Concluding some terms with a couple of steel firms
  When they left fully loaded for Cleveland
  And later that night when the ship's bell rang
  Could it be the north wind they'd been feelin'?
  
  The wind in the wires made a tattle-tale sound
  And a wave broke over the railin'
  And every man knew, as the captain did too
  'Twas the witch of November come stealin'
  The dawn came late and the breakfast had to wait
  When the gales of November came slashin'
  When afternoon came it was freezin' rain
  In the face of a hurricane west wind
  
  When suppertime came the old cook came on deck sayin'
  "Fellas, it's too rough to feed ya"
  At seven P.M. a main hatchway caved in, he said
  "Fellas, it's been good to know ya"
  The captain wired in he had water comin' in
  And the good ship and crew was in peril
  And later that night when his lights went outta sight
  Came the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald
  
  Does anyone know where the love of God goes
  When the waves turn the minutes to hours?
  The searchers all say they'd have made Whitefish Bay
  If they'd put fifteen more miles behind her
  They might have split up or they might have capsized
  They may have broke deep and took water
  And all that remains is the faces and the names
  Of the wives and the sons and the daughters
  
  Lake Huron rolls, Superior sings
  In the rooms of her ice-water mansion
  Old Michigan steams like a young man's dreams
  The islands and bays are for sportsmen
  And farther below Lake Ontario
  Takes in what Lake Erie can send her
  And the iron boats go as the mariners all know
  With the gales of November remembered
  
  In a musty old hall in Detroit they prayed
  In the Maritime Sailors' Cathedral
  The church bell chimed till it rang twenty-nine times
  For each man on the Edmund Fitzgerald

  The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
  Of the big lake they call Gitche Gumee
  Superior, they said, never gives up her dead
  When the gales of November come early

Re: These Men dove to the Edmund Fitzgerald shipwreck decades ago. Their stories

#14
post #9

I lived on an Island in Lake Huron for about 5 years and went visiting the Lake Superior area many times. To call it a lake does not really do it justice: it's an inland sea, and a most impressive one. I've seen the lake from the shore in more than one storm and it didn't look any different than the ocean, except that it seemed in many ways more violent. I asked the locals about it and they said that the lake is more…

Heh, yea my parents were big on folk music so I heard the song a lot growing up, and was always vaguely puzzled how a such a large ship could get in so much trouble on just a lake.

I still remember the "oh I get it" moment when I visited Michigan as a teen and saw Lake Michigan for the first time.

Re: These Men dove to the Edmund Fitzgerald shipwreck decades ago. Their stories

#15
post #5

The wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald is located at a depth of 530 feet (162 meters) below the surface of Lake Superior. That's an extremely risky technical deep dive. There were probably more people in space than non-saturation diving at this depth.

Presumably also open circuit not rebreather given this was mid 90s. It's a pity the article doesn't detail their dive plan, the gas quantities must have been staggering. Nowadays this type of diving would be done using an eCCR (and backup open circuit), where some software on a microcontroller controls the amount of oxygen in a breathing loop. A scrubber (hopefully) removes the CO2. Changing the gas mixture as you go…

There's more detail on the dive in this account: https://cambrianfoundation.org/2000/02/28/1995-expedition/

Re: These Men dove to the Edmund Fitzgerald shipwreck decades ago. Their stories

#16
post #5

The wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald is located at a depth of 530 feet (162 meters) below the surface of Lake Superior. That's an extremely risky technical deep dive. There were probably more people in space than non-saturation diving at this depth.

Presumably also open circuit not rebreather given this was mid 90s. It's a pity the article doesn't detail their dive plan, the gas quantities must have been staggering. Nowadays this type of diving would be done using an eCCR (and backup open circuit), where some software on a microcontroller controls the amount of oxygen in a breathing loop. A scrubber (hopefully) removes the CO2. Changing the gas mixture as you go…

Right, Terrence Tysall and Mike Zlatopolsky (Zee) dove the Edmund Fitzgerald in 1995 using open circuit gear. This article by Tysall gives some details of their dive plan.

https://advanceddivermagazine.com/articles/fitz/fitz.html

Re: These Men dove to the Edmund Fitzgerald shipwreck decades ago. Their stories

#17

The wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald is located at a depth of 530 feet (162 meters) below the surface of Lake Superior. That's an extremely risky technical deep dive. There were probably more people in space than non-saturation diving at this depth.

500-foot waters but the ship was 700+ long. The size of cargo ships boggles the mind. The largest space rockets are toys compared to any modern cargo ship.

The relevant xkcd - https://xkcd.com/1040/ (there's a large version of it too)

There's a mentioned fun fact that is what reminded me of this:

    The Edmund Fitzgerald, the Kursk, and the Lusitania all sank in water shallower than they were long.
Elsecomment there was a mention of diving, there are lines for diving records too.

Re: These Men dove to the Edmund Fitzgerald shipwreck decades ago. Their stories

#19
post #9

I lived on an Island in Lake Huron for about 5 years and went visiting the Lake Superior area many times. To call it a lake does not really do it justice: it's an inland sea, and a most impressive one. I've seen the lake from the shore in more than one storm and it didn't look any different than the ocean, except that it seemed in many ways more violent. I asked the locals about it and they said that the lake is more…

Heh, yea my parents were big on folk music so I heard the song a lot growing up, and was always vaguely puzzled how a such a large ship could get in so much trouble on just a lake. I still remember the "oh I get it" moment when I visited Michigan as a teen and saw Lake Michigan for the first time.

I assume you thought the "hurricane west wind" line from the song was exaggerated. The winds down the middle of the lake, in certain seasons, are 80mph.
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