video shot from Blackrocks, Presque Isle, Marquette, MI. National weather service issued storm warning with wind gusting 55-65mph and waves 17 - 25 feet.
I grew up in Michigan as a young kid and my family loved to travel, so I was lucky enough to have swum in all five of the Great Lakes. Lake Superior was the coldest for sure, as well as the most beautiful, with lake Michigan running a close 2nd. We boated in Lake Michigan, and Huron in the Saginaw Bay area. Back in the late 1950's Lake Erie was a septic tank, Ontario was another deep cold lake that I had the least experience in. During that time frame the St. Lawrence Seaway introduced the Lamprey eel into all the Great Lakes and just about decimated all the Great Lake fishing. This allowed the Alewife to enter the lakes with no fish to control their population, where they would die and pile up on the shorelines in massive piles of rotting Alewife. Also during the mid 1960's Lake Michigan was at its lowest recorded level. I was amazed when I came back later to Lake Michigan to see it at full pool, with no stinking rotting Alewife's. BTW, Awesome Wave Video, I could watch that for hours. It would have been awesome if you had a drone to go out and follow some of them killer waves into the shore.
Beautiful scene in this video. The power in the Great Lakes in these storms is incredible. My mom and dad lived near Lexington, Mich for a few years. A northeasterly storm would howl all night long and bring such changes to the beaches along the coast. Truly amazing. We're blessed to have the Great Lakes.
Great footage. I used to live on the Canadian side, the Ontario northern shore of Superior as a kid. It was majestic, but cold, and when the weather turned, powerful and forbidding. Thanks for the shots.
Thanks for posting this. Brings back old memories living in MN as a kid. I'd hike the rocky shores all around Superior/Duluth just to watch waves. I've seen some big waves on Mille Lacs Lake. favorite was big waves made of ice pushing into shore. I Live in Missoula Montana now, in the mountains.
A fine example of the Gales of November. I met a sailor in a Fisherman's bar in FL He said he tried working on Superior for 1 season and after November he was ready to go back to dealing with Hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico. Hard to believe a Lake can be that violent.
“That’s a hundred footer!” Forgiven inaccuracy. It’s an exclamation of awe. I’ve watched Pacific storm swells break on rocky shores and my brain just couldn’t wrap itself around the situation. The wave heights were huge but sometimes it was just too much to grasp the perspective. Sometimes we need to stop the brain rattle and let ourselves be overwhelmed from the safety of a great vantage point. What a gift to be alive.
I noticed the environment Canada buoys were showing waves above 5 meters (16 feet) that day and that was still hundreds of km's away from where the waves were likely biggest in your video! They may have been even bigger there with all that added fetch. Thanks for posting and great video.
The waves are fun to watch though. I used to like going to the doctor when I was a kid because the waiting room windows looked over Duluth/Superior harbor and you could see the HUGE waves come crashing in. I miss it.
Very true, as there were 30 ft waves bearing down on the Big Fitz and Captain McSorley was quoted saying, We are holding our own. After that, she was completely lost and went down without so much of a mayday.
Nice footage. Superior's the most beautiful of the 5 great lakes and it is also the angriest and most volatile. People need to treat it with the utmost respect: calm pleasant weather can turn ugly in an instant. Remember, this is the lake that claimed the giant ore carrier "Edmund Fitzgerald", snapping the ship literally in two like a matchstick with no survivors.
When my mom was a kid, her best friend's dad worked on the Fitz. They'd go have lunch with him on the ship. He retired before the sinking thankfully. But it hit people hard up in Superior/Duluth when that happened.
Very well written comment Al Cd. Agree with all that you wrote as the Captain of the Big Fitz, Captain McSorley was quoted saying that these seas were the roughest he's ever sailed on in his 40 year experisnce as a sailer working his way up to ship's master.
@@LadyYoop As it should be. Leave well enough alone, unless there are continued studies and factual proof of what may have caused her to go down, however, unfortunately, we all may never really know for sure the real, true reason why the Big Fitz went down, there will always be speculation and theories, just like the Kennedy assassination, however, no real, true concrete answers or proof to as why or how this has happened.
Hey Andrea, do you have an email address at which we could contact you regarding this video? We would be interested to discuss a license to use this video if this is generally possible? (i.e. via email) :) Cheers, Felix
Far more dangerous then the ocean because the frequency of the waves coming in. No room to grab one's breath, but there are people who will try. This is awesome, thanks for sharing,.
Massive, big, badass Lake! Nasty, big badass Lake! Tiny ocean! Tiny freshwater little badass ocean, that's what it is! It's a tiny ocean! A tiny freshwater big bad ass don't fuck with me ocean! And just to be clear... I say *tiny*... well..... tiny only in respect to you know, bodies of water like the Atlantic and the Pacific. Otherwise it's freaking huge. That is an awesome badass body of water. And the cool part about it is, that it can be as smooth as glass and calm and relaxed and soothing, or it can kick your ass ten ways to Sunday! It's almost like this thing has a personality. It can be calm and happy, or it can be mean and Bitchie. And it just does the thing. And I are little people people parts can just watch. Watch the big nature do its thing.
North wind was the best swimming in summer. The top water from canada would blow in with the big waves and that is about as warm as it got. South wind it was ice cold, usually mirror still and the black flies would eat you alive. When you grow up with superior it becomes unremarkable over time except that you miss it when you have been away for too long.
Lake Superior is angry here!!! It is just beautiful, here. I live in Michigan, Up- North is just stunning, come see us, we'd love to have you!!!🌲🌲🌲🌲🌊🌊🌊.....
Yo estuve en Milwaukee hace unos años, y me tocó ver cómo la gente c metía al agua en año nuevo, les dicen los osos polares. Un sobrino me dijo mete la mano al agua, ya me andaba, casi c me congelo.
These are the type of waves that sunk the Edmund Fitzgerald in 9/10 November, 1975. However in November, 1913 a huge double hurricane force storm sank or capsized over 24 big boats on the Greats Lakes with well over 250 crewmen drowned. I don't understand why anyone wants to sail on Lake Superior in November. Worse than ocean conditions are the fact that many shallow shoals mean a ship can bottom out. This reality channelized ship traffic on Lake Superior into specific channels. The waves that sunk the Edmund Fitzgerald were 25 to 30 feet high but a rogue wave even higher could have swept over the Fitzgerald forcing its bow downward into the water causing it to plunge downward. The Fitzgerald may have had a hull issue including several big hatches that were letting in water into the ship. The captain of the Fitzgerald reported he was listing to his portside with his pumps working to remove the water from the cargo area. However, it is quite a certainty that the winds coming from the northwest were able to build up a lot of energy creating large waves. It was probably several conditions together that sunk the Fitzgerald. But the radar operator on the Arthur M. Anderson reported the Fitzgerald was there one revolution then the next scan of the radar the Edmund Fitzgerald was gone. What happened to this big ore carrier happened very suddenly with no radio distress calls. Real scary things to think about when looking at those large Lake Superior waves. I went into the Army instead of the Navy in part because of the my thinking about those 29 men on the Fitzgerald.
It was much worse than this when the Edmund Fitzgerald sank with all of those crew members aboard... no survivors. And it was sleeting/snowing on top of it all. A ship wreck in severe, icy waters. Imagine what those guys experienced out in the middle of nowhere, with no one to help! Makes even one who enjoys large bodies of water want to become a landlubber!
Amazing footage of the Lady Ice Blue in her full glory! Lake Superior is my favorite place on earth. Thanks for sharing! I'm making a video about Superior. Wondering if you'd mind if I used some of your footage??
This particular location is often videoed, and most are well done and pretty. However, this by far the most scary video of this spot that I have ever seen. (You die if you fall in).
