Today marks the 50th anniversary of a tragic maritime disaster that claimed the lives of 29 crew members, as one of the largest freighters to ever navigate the Great Lakes met its fate. This catastrophic event unfolded near Whitefish Point, Michigan, where a massive storm led to the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald.

In a solemn gathering, thousands convened on Monday to honor those lost in the shipwreck. The Edmund Fitzgerald, which embarked on its maiden voyage from Detroit in 1958, was hailed as the greatest ship to sail the Great Lakes. Yet, on November 10, 1975, it succumbed to a fierce storm, a calamity that remains one of the most enigmatic shipwrecks in history.

For Deb Champeau, the memories of that day are particularly poignant. Her father, Buck, served as an engineer on the ship. At just 17 years old, Deb was in her senior year of high school when she learned of her father’s tragic demise.

Deb Champeau’s dad, Buck, was an engineer on the ship. She was 17 years old, a senior in high school, when her father perished in the wreckage. 

“I got called out of history class to go home immediately, and that’s what I did. We waited and waited,” she said. “It seemed like eternity for confirmation that, first of all, the ship was gone, and second of all, that my dad was on it.” 

Deb says she initially hoped her dad was on a lifeboat or able to swim to shore, but none of the 29 victims were ever found.

“That is the mystery part of it. Did it happen in seconds? Did it happen in half an hour?” said Ric Mixter, who has been researching the Edmund Fitzgerald for decades. He even explored the wreckage with a submarine. 

“Twenty-nine guys … vanished into thin air. The National Enquirer reportedly said aliens took the crew. This is how mysterious it was,” he said. 

The crew went down with the ship without issuing a distress signal. There are many theories why. One of the most popular is that the ship was taken down by a giant wave during a storm. 

Now, 50 years after the Edmund Fitzgerald sank in Lake Superior, much of the mystery remains. Was it a 60-foot wave or something else?

The largest ship to ever sink in the Great Lakes remains broken into pieces, 500 feet below the surface.