NASA/MODIS
Lake Superior Ice: March 31, 2014
Lake Superior remained nearly 90 percent ice-covered on Monday. No laker has yet reached the Soo Locks a week after the March 25 opening.
One week into the shipping season, ice on Lake Superior has sent two vessels – including an icebreaker – limping back to port, and no laker has yet reached the Soo Locks.
Part of a cutter-led convoy that left western Lake Superior in the middle of last week, the 1,000-foot barge Presque Isle developed minor cracks in its hull from repeatedly pushing through ice. The ship returned to Duluth on Friday to repair the damage. It will remain dockside this week.
The freighters Cason J. Callaway and John G. Munson, led by the U.S. Coast Guard heavy icebreaker Mackinaw, continued east across the Lake, but it’s been extremely challenging, says Randy Elliott, a U.S. Coast Guard vessel traffic manager in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan.
“They’re 15 to 20 miles south of Michipicoten Island,” says Randy. “Their goal is to make it to Whitefish Point tonight, and that’s probably 50-50.”
“The ice is very solid all through Whitefish,” he adds. It’s more than 4 feet thick in some places, with 8-foot windrows, and Lake Superior remained about 90 percent ice-covered on Monday.
The ships may not reach Sault Ste. Marie until the weekend. Once there, they’ll still have to traverse the ice-choked St. Marys River. Three upbound lakers are waiting near the lower river for the downbound vessels to pass through.
The ice also knocked out the 140-foot icebreaker Morro Bay last week as it worked in the Thunder Bay harbor with the Katmai Bay. After it lost rudder control, the ship had to be towed to Duluth by its counterpart, with assistance on the final leg from the cutter Alder. Divers found that the Morro Bay’s rudder was hanging on by a single bolt. It’s not yet known how long the repairs will take.
Rather than trying to cross the Lake, the Mesabi Miner hunkered down in the Twin Ports over the weekend after delivering coal to Taconite Harbor. The ship had planned to load more coal in Superior and then leave for Marquette.
“There are a number of vessels in delay all over the Great Lakes,” says Randy. “If you’re going in or out of [Lake] Superior, conditions are horrible.”
At this time last year, an oceangoing vessel had already transited the entire Great Lakes-St. Lawrence Seaway system and reached Duluth. The Federal Hunter’s March 30 arrival in the Twin Ports was the earliest ever by a saltie. This year, the St. Lawrence Seaway just opened to traffic today.
To assist on the upper Great Lakes, the Canadian Coast Guard has dispatched the heavy icebreaker Pierre Radisson, a vessel that normally works in the Atlantic. It’s expected to arrive in three or four days.
"All the fleets are going to do their best to make up the early cargo deliveries," says Adele Yorde, public relations manager for the Duluth Seaway Port Authority. The silver lining of the cold and snowy winter, she says, is that it should further boost lake levels, which on Lake Superior nearly returned to normal last month. That will allow ships to carry more cargo on each run and chip away at the lost tonnage over the course of the season.
Meanwhile, says Adele, in Lake Superior's harbors, "everybody’s just sitting tight, waiting."
Correction: The Mesabi Miner transported coal to Taconite Harbor, Minnesota, from Superior, Wisconsin. It did not load cargo at Taconite Harbor.