More than 80 years after it sank with its captain, the wreck was recently discovered at the bottom of Lake Superior. The captain mysteriously decided to remain on the ship rather than flee with his crew.
The 244-foot bulk carrier, named Arlington, was finally discovered about 55 miles north of Michigan’s Keweenaw Peninsula in 1940 after falling more than 600 feet, authorities announced this week.
of The Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society (GLSHS) stated: He teamed up with shipwreck researcher Dan Fountain to discover the missing ship, which was carrying wheat from Port Arthur, Ontario, to Owen Sound in the same Canadian province.
Under the command of the experienced Captain Frederick “Taty Bug” Burke, the ship encountered a severe storm on April 30, 1940, along with another ship, the Collingwood, that struck both ships, the historical society said. did.
Arlington’s first mate asked the ship to reroute closer to Canada’s North Shore to protect it from the wind and waves, but Burke refused and the ship crossed the open lake. I asked them to stay the course.
The next morning, the ship’s chief engineer, Fred Gilbert, warned the crew that the Arlington was beginning to sink, and the crew scrambled. The crew voluntarily abandoned the ship without orders from Burke, the historical society said.
But Mr. Burke did not change his stance, and his decision remains a mystery, the historical society said.
The group even cited reports from the time that he waved to Collingwood from the pilothouse when faced with a watery grave.
“She collapsed quickly,” Gilbert, an engineer, said in the May 3, 1940 issue of the Toronto Daily Star. CNN reported. “We barely had time to get the lifeboats out. The ship was covered in ice, so when we pushed it over, our hands froze.”
Some have speculated that Mr Burke may have followed the high seas custom of having the captain go down with the ship.
“When I heard that Captain Burke went down with the ship, I wasn’t at all surprised,” George McCurry, whose father was Arlington’s first mate, said at the time, according to CNN.
“He was a real sailor type, rough and ready and not the type to abandon a sinking ship. He will surely be missed around the ship.”
Fountain, a researcher, came to the historical society last year about the possibility of a shipwreck. The Historical Society then pulled the ship out onto the lake and used Marine Sonic Technology’s side-scan sonar to pinpoint the submerged ship before divers positively identified it as the Arlington.
“These targets don’t always lead to anything…but this time it was definitely a shipwreck. A shipwreck with an interesting and perhaps mysterious story,” said Bruce Lin, GLHSS executive director. said in a statement.
“I’m so excited to be able to solve just one more of Lake Superior’s many mysteries,” Fountain said. So far outside the lake. I hope this final chapter of her story brings some closure to Captain Burke’s family. ”
