Duluth’s Most Elusive Leviathan Pays a Rare Visit

Only my third time seeing this one, and the first arrival! And every time at night. The Edgar B Speer arriving through the Canal! Sadly she didn’t salute but I didn’t mind too much! Among the thousand foot lakers, she is by far the least seen in the Twin Ports, usually frequenting Two Harbors almost exclusively. On this trip she sailed into Duluth to refuel, then took a break at on the outside slip of the CN ore dock before transiting the front channel to Superior, where she loaded ore at that dock, and departed a day and a half later. One of only two ships remaining with a shuttle boom self unloader (and the only deck mounted one), the ship is unique, yet familiar.

The ship was assembled in 3 pieces, with the stern and rear half of the cargo holds being built in Loraine OH, the front half being built in Toledo OH, and the pilothouse being constructed in Chicago. The individual pieces were all shipped to Loraine and put together to form the 1004ft vessel, which set sail for the first time in June, 1980. Between her length and massive 75,000 ton carrying capacity, she is the third largest freshwater vessel in the world after Paul R Tregurtha and Edwin H Gott by physical size. She is also fitted with two 9,630 horsepower engines, making her one of the fastest and most powerful ships on the Lakes. Her defining feature are the highly unusual twin 52ft shuttle booms which sit perpendicular to her deck, just below the pilothouse. They can extend a short distance over her rail to unload into dockside hoppers, which was hoped at one point to be the future of Great Lakes systems, but was altimately only installed in two ports: Conneaut OH, and Gary IN. Because of this the ship is currently quite limited in her port options, but continues to operate consistently despite that. The ship has had an incident free career since her launch. In 1996 her near sister Edwin H Gott was converted to a more traditional unloading system, leaving Speer with the only deck mounted shuttle boom in the world.

It’s always a special occasion to see her in Duluth, and hope to see her again, maybe even in daylight for once, although I think I've got night videos dialed in a bit better! Hope everyone enjoys!