Profile of the Ship and the Wreck

Length: 729 feet

Height: 39 feet

Breadth: 75 feet

Weight empty: 13,632 tons

Hull: 301

Registry number: US 277437

Ship Builder: Great Lakes Engineering Works

Engine Manufacturer: Westinghouse Electric Corporation

Christened: June 8, 1958

First voyage: Sept. 24, 1958

Final resting place: Lake Superior, 530ft underwater

Sinking: November 10, 1975 with no survivors

Facts about the Fitz, Crew and the Lakes:

• The Fitzgerald was named after Edmund Fitzgerald, president of Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company.

• The Edmund Fitzgerald foundered only 17 miles from the "safe haven" of Whitefish Point.

• The Fitzgerald was headed from Superior, Wisconsin to Zug Island on the Detroit River when it sank on November 10, 1975

• The Fitzgerald broke her own records for most cargo carried in one year several times in the short 17 year lifespan of the ship.

• Robert Rafferty wasn't even originally scheduled to be on the ship!  He was filling in for someone with bleeding ulcers.

• The final voyage of the Edmund Fitzgerald was rumored as Captain McSorley's final voyage before retirement.

• McCarthy and McSorley made a "pact" to sail out their years together before dying together in the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.

• Gitche Gumee is Ojibwa for "Big Lake."