The Manitoulin Lake Freighter has been disabled and stranded in the Buffalo River’s Lake Erie shoreline since Wednesday, January 22, 2025, according to a report published yesterday by The Scuba News Canada.
Officials said a second U.S. Coast Guard icebreaking vessel came on Saturday to assist in freeing the freighter, which had been helping the Manitoulin since Thursday. A ship from the Canadian Coast Guard was also helping in the endeavour.
On Thursday afternoon, the ship started to move. A foot of ice encircled it after it became stuck for the first time on Wednesday at 11:40 a.m.
Thick ice, which the U.S. Coast Guard said is typical this time of year amid freezing weather, immobilized the Manitoulin, which was making her way back to Michigan after finishing a routine delivery of wheat.
Following its discharge, the US Coast Guard followed the Manitoulin ship for 32 kilometres (20 miles) before it came to rest in open waters. The freighter will spend the remainder of the winter at Sarnia, Ontario, after traversing the remainder of Lake Erie and then ascending the Detroit and St. Clair Rivers. There were no reported problems, injuries, or damage to the crew or ship.
Twenty-one percent of the Great Lakes were covered by ice, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). By this time in January, the area typically has about 24% ice cover. At 86% ice cover, Lake Erie is at its greatest level since 2022.
Since the first wallop of snow in the last days of November 2024, residents of Ontario’s snowbelt regions around Lake Huron and Georgian Bay have been especially hard hit by lake-effect snow squall events, which seem to be going on forever. This is because the Great Lakes were open, which is a troublemaker condition that causes a lot of snow to fall quickly due to prevailing winds and the warm Great Lakes.
Several municipalities have reported high totals from numerous lake-effect snowfall occurrences this winter thus far, including Gravenhurst, Bracebridge, Orillia, Barrie, Kincardine, and Owen Sound.
Residents of snowstorms are relieved when the Great Lakes freeze because, perhaps, the lake effect snow will lessen.
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