OTTAWA, TODAY – Mr. Stéphane Ouellette, President and Chief Executive Officer, Merchant Navy Commemorative Theme Project (MNCTP), remembered the sinking of the S.S. Edmund Fitzgerald, and all of the 29 crew members that tragically died on November 10, 1975.

The ill–fated voyage of the S.S. Edmund Fitzgerald began on November 9, 1975, at the Burlington Northern Railroad Dock No.1, Superior, Wisconsin, when she was loaded with 26,116 long tons of taconite pellets (made of processed iron ore). The ship then departed for the steel mill on Zug Island, near Detroit, Michigan.

The S.S. Edmund Fitzgerald was first launched in 1958, and weighted 13,632 tons and was 729 feet long. She was built within a foot of the maximum length allowed for passage through the soon–to–be completed St. Lawrence Seaway, and was the largest carrier on the Great Lakes until 1971. The Fitzgerald was labeled "The Pride of the American Flag".

In 1964, she became the first ship on the Great Lakes to carry more than a million tons of ore through the Soo Locks. Early in the morning of November 10, the S.S. Edmund Fitzgerald encountered winds as strong as 80 mph, and waves more than 30 feet high.

The 729–foot ship took on water and eventually snapped in two, plunging more than 500 feet to the lake bottom, where she remains. The shipwreck is located approximately 17 miles northwest of Whitefish Point, Michigan. In 1995, divers retrieved the ship's

200–pound bronze bell, which is kept as a memorial at the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum in Michigan. Bodies of the crew have never been recovered.