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Unusually Clear Water Offers Glimpse of Lake Michigan Shipwrecks
Numerous shipwrecks rest along Lake Michigan shoreline. When the ice melted, the water was especially clear, offering stunning views.
The crew of a Coast Guard plane on routine patrol recently caught several photos showing shipwrecks at the floor of Lake Michigan. This is the James McBride. (All photos via U.S. Coast Guard Air Station, Traverse City)
The deep, blue waters of Lake Michigan are especially clear after the winter ice melt, providing some stunning aerial views of shipwrecks at the lake’s floor, including the 121-foot brig James McBride, which ran aground during a storm in 1857.
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The U.S. Coast Guard Air Station in Traverse City captured the images in mid-April and posted them on Facebook in an album titled “Shipwreck Sunday.” Since then, the photos have been featured internationally in the UK, Australia, and China.
The photos, snapped during routine patrol, represent just a few of the many shipwrecks along the Lake Michigan shoreline. They were taken near Sleeping Bear Point along the shoreline to Leland to Northport.
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The remains of the McBride lie in five to 15 feet of water near Sleeping Bear Point. She was launched on April Fool’s Day in 1848, and accomplished a sensational feat – delivering the first cargo direct from the Atlantic to a Lake Michigan port – before falling to the lake’s floor on Oct. 19, 1857.
After journeying to the Manitou Islands for a cargo of woods, she was returning to Chicago when she encountered a gale and was driven ashore near Sleeping Bear Dune.
Also pictured on the page is the Rising Sun, a 133-foot wooden steamer ran aground just north of Pyramid Point on during an early-season snowstorm Oct. 29, 1917. Her wreckage now rests in six to 12 feet of water.
The ship was heading to High Island with to get potatoes, rutabagas and lumberwhen she the storm, according to an account of famous Lake Michigan shipwrecks by The Leelanau News.
The Coast Guard asks anyone with information on the shipwrecks to post it on Facebook.
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