John G. Munson - An Interesting Salute Entertains the Crowd

Here is the John G. Munson seen departing Duluth, Minnesota in the late afternoon hours of December 16, 2023. She had loaded taconite pellets at the Canadian National dock in West Duluth for delivery to Cleveland, Ohio. The video starts shortly after the Munson has left the CN dock and is making her way across the St. Louis River Bay before passing under the John A. Blatnik bridge at Rice’s Point. We then catch up with the Munson again at Canal Park where she makes the turn to line up with the shipping canal and depart onto Lake Superior, passing under the Aerial Lift Bridge along the way.

While it may not be readily obvious watching this video, a very large crowd had gathered at Canal Park to watch the Munson depart. Most of the crowd was waiting for the nightly 5pm opening of the Bentleyville "Tour of Lights" at nearby Bayfront Festival Park. The Munson served as pre-show entertainment for the crowd, giving everyone the sights and sounds of the classic Great Lakes freighter. As she passed under the Aerial Lift Bridge, the Munson blew a salute to entertain the crowd (and to acknowledge the bridge, of course). I suspect the Munson was going for a master salute of three long and two short blasts, but what we ended up getting was two long and three short blasts. The bridge responded with a proper master salute, with the correct sequence of blasts. The crowd didn't seem to notice (or care) if the salute wasn't quite the standard, as they still waved and cheered. The crew on board the deck of the Munson were also enjoying the attention, waving back and taking photos.

The reason for my trip to Duluth on this date was to watch the departure of the Kaye E. Barker, a classic laker that we rarely see in Duluth. She is visible at the Midwest Energy Terminal dock early in this video and would be making her departure shortly after the Munson. Stay tuned for that in an upcoming video! Keen viewers may also notice a "saltie" loading at the Cenex Harvest States dock in the background. That is the Narie, who was loading wheat for eventual delivery to Algeria.

The John G. Munson was built in 1952 and was originally 666 feet in length. Unlike a lot of lakers that were converted to self-unloaders later in their careers, the Munson was originally built as a self-unloader... allowing her to serve a variety of ports where shoreside unloading equipment wasn't available. She originally sailed for the Bradley Transportation Line from Rogers City, Michigan and was primarily used to haul stone before being acquired by the U.S. Steel Fleet (now operated as the Great Lakes Fleet), where her role was expanded to also carry iron ore. Today, she tends to alternate between hauling limestone and iron ore, often bringing limestone to Duluth and then departing with iron ore. The Munson was lengthened to 768 feet in 1976, giving her a cargo carrying capacity of 25,550 tons held in 7 cargo holds. Her original steam turbine was replaced by two MAK diesel engines in 2016. While the loss of another steam engine is mourned by some boat watchers, the conversion to diesel has helped to keep the Munson on the Lakes and still in service... hopefully for many more years to come!
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