Winter fleet at Fincantieri Bay Shipbuilding in Sturgeon Bay, March 24, 2025. PC: Fox 11 Online
STURGEON BAY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) — With the arrival of spring, the season for shipping on the Great Lakes typically begins.
The event coincides with the opening of the Soo Locks on Lake Superior in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. The winter fleet in Sturgeon Bay is getting ready to leave, as well.
“It generally opens up right around this time. Sometimes in the third week of March. Obviously, we had a fairly mild winter. The ice opened up quite a bit. We know the Sturgeon Bay Ship Canal and the Sturgeon Bay area is pretty much ice-free, as of the last couple of weeks,” said Sam Perlman, Door County Maritime Museum deputy director.
Perlman says the winter fleet usually lays up at Fincantieri Bay Shipbuilding in Sturgeon Bay, where the vessels typically undergo maintenance and repairs. On Monday morning, at least seven ships were spotted at the shipyards.
“We talk about the Goliaths of the Great Lakes, the thousand-footers. There are 13 thousand-footers on the Great Lakes. Six of them were built right here in Sturgeon Bay, so it’s always an exciting time,” said Perlman.
Perlman says Great Lakes shipping compliments the area’s maritime history and is vital to the region’s economy.
“Time is absolutely money with these vessels, and the time sitting at the dock is money that they’re not spending time out on the water, bringing cargo to and from ports of the Great Lakes and making money for their owners. So we anticipate that the vessels that are here in Sturgeon Bay will leave any day now. In fact, we’ve see a couple of them start their engines and have some smoke coming out of their smokestacks. So again, we think they’re pretty close to departing for the summer season,” he said.
Track the winter fleet and other vessels as they move in waters all around the world using these links:
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