Great Lakes Stats #1: How many shipwrecks lie beneath the Great Lakes?

Between 1875 and 1975, roughly 6,000 ships have gone down in the Great Lakes — that’s about one every week — taking an estimated 30,000 lives, or about six people a week.

The Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum states that as a best estimate, not a precise count. Some historians think the true number could exceed 25,000 wrecks in total. Still wild.

A century of storms, ice, and iron beneath the surface.

image credit: Smithsonian