Why Did She Split In Half?

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You didn't mention one key fact. The Master of the Anderson risked HIS life, crew, and ship, to go searching for the Fitz after she went down. He made it to Whitefish Bay. Reported her missing, then turned around and went back out. Into a November Storm. On Lake Superior. That had claimed the Pride of the American Side.

Most people underestimate the power of the Great Lakes. They are more like inland seas that fresh water lakes. The waves on the great lakes have a much shorter frequency than in the ocean making it harder to ride them out.

Living in Michigan, many children learn about this wreck in school. The lakes have claimed thousands, but gave us a maritime heritage that I've seen light up the eyes of children when they see a tallship set her main or the lights of a freighter steam across the horizon. Tragedies like this become a shared history.

The Anderson crew were heroes that day, both guiding the Fitzgerald, looking for her after losing contact and leading the hours long search operation after the storm

I was just on the SS Arthur M. Anderson as 2nd Assistant Engineer and boy is she a strong ship. 70 years old and still keeping up with the much newer ships.

My great grandfather was a helmsman on the great lakes for most of his life, and he had a lot of opinions about the Fitzgerald going down. Foremost of this was the stress put on it by the choppiness of the waves on the lake--in the ocean, the waves are bigger than the ships, so you just ride on top--but on the great lakes, the waves are smaller, such that you can have a wave at the front and back of the ship but not at the middle, and vice versa. This causes it to bend one way and the other over and over, and on a welded ship like this it won't cause damage until it just snaps in half.

As a Michigander, the story of the Fitzgerald is almost legend. Old timers use it as a warning to explain the power of the Lakes. Living on the 3rd coast is interesting, almost everyone is a boater. Outsiders think the Lakes are just big lakes but they are actually inland seas. Events like rogue waves have been recorded, and the storms are no joke. The Fitzgerald is one of over 6000 ships that lay on the muddy bottoms. These bodies of water are not to be taken lightly. For an example of how large they are, Lake St. Claire looks like a swimming pool compared to the Great Lakes and it's still the 15th largest lake in the country...

The Fitz also needed to go in drydock for repair she was badly neglected, and her sister ship was proof when she went in drydock after the sinking of the Fitzgerald. There's a good interview with the nephew of Ralph Walton and talks about the condition of the edmund fitzgerald when she sank

I couldn't see this video title without thinking "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"

Personally I believe it was a combination of the the load draft being increased, the high seas, and her bottoming out. The captain of the Anderson at the time, Bernie Cooper, was adamite that the only way the Fitz would have lost her railings was if she either stress fractured or bottomed out. The hatch cover theory was also highly frowned upon by other captains, as even if the hatches aren't fully secured, they weigh several tons and would remain firmly on the deck in heavy seas. With any water coming through being minimal to none. My personal take is for one reason or another, Edmund Fitzgerald sustained underwater damage just south of caribou island. She either stress fractured or bottomed out on a shoal. After that point, she started slowly dropping in the water. As the waves rolled up her deck, her bow would end up plunging down into them. Eventually, the inflow of water became too great, she plunged into another wave and never came back up. The first sign to the crew that anything was wrong would've been her impacting the sea floor and the subsequent wall of water smashing through the cabin windows, explaining the lack of a mayday.

May God rest the men (29) that lost their lives when Big Fitz went down. The bodies are still there (except 1 found lying on the lake bottom next to the wreck) still intact due to the cold and lack of bacteria at that depth). The site has been declared a gravesite and no one can go there without government permission. The artist Gordon Lightfoot donated all the proceeds from his song The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald to the families of the men lost in the sinking.

The fact the SS Arthur B Homer the exact sister ship of the Edmund Fitzgerald was scrapped a decade after the Fitzgerald loss despite many millions of dollars spent to lengthen her years prior, leads me to believe stress/hull failure more likely than shoaling. Former Fitzgerald crewman Richard Orgel and Red Burgner testified Fitzgerald's hull was "wiggling" too much in bad weather. Even saying Captain McSorley himself was frightened by it sometimes. The Lake Fleets deep down knew there likely was a design flaw, and so nobody bought The Arthur B Homer and they quietly scrapped the Homer blaming the economy. yet older vessels with smaller cargo capacity were still sailing. But who knows? (Shrug)

This wreck struck my family pretty hard and I have always wanted to know the answers to these questions. I appreciate you taking the time. Thanks.

My deer blind over looks whitefish bay, during the week after it went down. Over 20 ships were still anchored in the bay. Waves at whitefish point we're in the 16-18 foot range and winds were still minimum of 35 mph. The howling sound it made in the woods was deafening. Lake Superior's color changes during these winter storms, it turns a dark black... It is very intimidating, even evil looking.

When the Captain reported he had lost his radar, that was likely due to waves. That would mean that a wave roughly 40 feet high crashed over the bow (the radar was located on top of the bridge, about 39 feet above the water).

I grew up in Superior, WI, and one of my earliest memories is the night the Fitzgerald went down. My dad got called into work because of the storm, and I remember my mom following the story on the radio, as she waited for him to get home.

Great video. Anyone who's never heard, should listen to 'The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald' by Gordon Lightfoot. Amazing song. RIP to the crew of a beautiful ship.

I’m a chief mate on the Great Lakes in the Canadian fleet. I have always had a huge interest in this marine disaster. You did a very good job in explaining the dynamics of this disaster, with theories I do agree with, less the hatch covers being unsecured. I personally feel the hatch covers were secure, and I side with Captain Bernie Cooper, that she bottomed out on the shoal north of Caribou Island. The unsecured hatch cover theory in my opinion is just a cop out for the US Coast Guard.

My Father sailed this route as a wheelsman in the 1920s. He was involved in storms of this nature, always in November. He mentioned an incident where the Engineer threatened to put out the fires in the boilers because waves were pouring into the engine room and scalding the firemen coaling up the fires. That would have been a catastrophic decision. One of his ships, the Mathewston, was hauling wheat from the head of the lakes, and was nicknamed "The Hunchback" due to a warped hull it received during a bad storm. With huge waves that accompany the winds, and my Father often mentioned the "three sisters", the hull can be balancing primarily on one or two waves which works the structure back and forth, and eventual failure of the hull can occur. Respect to the lost sailors.