Diving the Daniel J. Morrell - 50 years later

The massive steel ship twisted in the giant waves just 18 miles off shore as it was tossed about.

Diving on shipwrecks in the Great Lakes has gone from being a passion to an obsession for me in the past few years. I’ve been moved by researching their stories and visiting the wrecks to photograph them firsthand. These ships have stories of heroism, stories of tragedy, mystery, and stories of great survival. These ships are now time capsules sitting on the bottom, preserved in time. Diving them is like visiting an underwater museum where they look like ghost ships sailing on the bottom of the lake. One of these time capsules is the Daniel J. Morrell, a 603-foot-long Great Lakes freighter that sank in the chilly waters off Port Austin, Michigan, just 50 years ago, on November 29th, 1966.

I read several books about the and its sole survivor’s tale, which captured my interest and inspired me to see the site for myself. I did more research to understand what the ship and its crew went through and to help me and the famous - both ships that were similar to the and with similar loss of life and I felt drawn to dive it and capture its final resting place 50 years later to see how it rests today and to retell her story.