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18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
The Great Lakes Storm of 1913, May 11, 2001
I've read two of Robert J. Hemming's books about Great Lakes storms and shipwrecks--this volume plus his "Gales of November: The Sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald." I prefer this book if for no other reason than it memorializes one of the most ferocious storms in Great Lakes history. The 1913 storm blew for four days in early November (11/07 - 11/12) and sank ships on Lakes Superior, Michigan, Huron (the worst hit) and Erie. Twelve ships were sunk and anywhere from 250 to 300 sailors died (the records weren't as strictly kept back then).November on the Great Lakes is always an anxious time for sailors (the Edmund Fitzgerald sank in a November storm), but the 1913 storm was a once-in-a-lifetime freak. Three weather fronts collided over the Lakes, producing hurricane-force winds, rain, lightning, and finally record-breaking snowfalls. The storm broke steel freighters in two, weighted them down with tons of freezing spray, pounded them with killer waves, and rolled them into the troughs between gigantic seas. It was astonishing that any lake-bound boat survived. Hemming relates the destructive power of the 'Big Blow' lake by lake, ship by ship, and even sailor by sailor if there happened to be survivors. Over Huron, where the northerly gales collided with the advancing low front from the Gulf of Mexico, the whole lake seemed to churn into the air and combine with the ice and snow of the storm. Eight ships went down on the second largest of the Great Lakes, and there were no survivors. Hemming includes a lengthy epilogue on other Great Lakes November gales, including the 1940 Armistice Day Storm, the sinking of the Bradley in 1966, and the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald in 1975. If you'd like to read more about the 'Big Blow' of 1913, I highly recommend Dwight Boyer's "True Tales of the Great Lakes" and William Ratigan's "Great Lakes Shipwrecks and Survivals."
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