March 16, 2020 - MarineLink
Along the 1,600-mile, ice gray arch of the St Lawrence Seaway, the 2020 Great Lakes commercial shipping season will lurch back to life on March 25 when the Soo Locks at Sault Ste. Marie, Mich. reopen. The ceremonial opening signals a passage with passable ice and the 114th Great Lakes season for its fleet of 45 venerable lakers. Most of these huge self-loading freight haulers are at least 50 years old, rust free, and fit; American steel sailing on a freshwater sea.
January 27, 2020 - Cleveland.com
Lakers are the stars of the Great Lakes. The up-to-1,000-foot freighters are eye-catching, mesmerizing, romantic vestiges of industrial glory days. And we can’t get over their size, whether they’re powering through Lake Erie or pivoting around the hair-pin curves of the Cuyahoga River. Interlake Steamship Co., which is based in Middleburg Heights and owns nine lakers, celebrates the beauty of the ships in its annual calendar.
May 24, 2019 - Hometown Focus
“Iron ore mined from the Minnesota range is truly one of the building blocks of America,” says Mark W. Barker, president of Interlake Steamship Company, which has a fleet of nine vessels that crisscross the Great Lakes, primarily loaded with this leading cargo. “This raw material powers the domestic steel industry and is critical to our manufacturing sectors and our national security. We are proud to be carrying it on our ships which are U.S. crewed, U.S.-built and U.S. owned.”May 24, 2019 - Hometown Focus
Interlake Steamship Company, headquartered in Ohio, has a fleet of nine self-unloading vessels, ranging in carrying capacity from 24,000 to 68,000 gross tons, with a total trip capacity of 390,360 gross tons. Interlake Steamship Company carries approximately 20 million tons of cargo annually. In 2016, the company completed a 10-year, $100 million fleet modernization program.
April 9, 2019 - Crain's Cleveland Business
In mid-2022, Interlake Steamship Co. will welcome the first new ship to its fleet since 1981. The Middleburg Heights-based U.S. flag fleet is partnering with Fincantieri Bay Shipbuilding in Sturgeon Bay, Wisc., on construction of the bulk carrier. A news release stated that the ship is "believed to be the first ship for U.S. Great Lakes service built on the Great Lakes since 1983." In an email, Interlake president Mark W. Barker said this is the first fully integrated ship the company has built since 1981. It did a tug-barge conversion in 1998. The addition of the new ship will bring Interlake Steamship's fleet to 10 active vessels, as it will be extending the fleet instead of replacing a ship.
April 9, 2019 - Duluth News Tribune
The first U.S.-flag laker to be built this century was commissioned this week and figures to be completed by mid-2022. The new "river-class" vessel will be built to transit the Great Lakes and service customers in some of the smaller harbors found in the rivers connecting the lakes. Commissioned by Interlake Steamship Company, based outside Cleveland, the 639-foot carrier capable of hauling 28,000 gross tons will be built in Sturgeon Bay, Wis., by Fincantieri Bay Shipbuilding. Both companies have 100-plus years of history on the Great Lakes. "We're proud to add it, announce it and ensure we serve our customers for years to come," Interlake Steamship President Mark Barker told the News Tribune. "It's being built with a lot of steel from Great Lakes steel mills to carry the products that help to do just that."
March 29, 2019 - Cleveland.com
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- You can’t help but stare at a freighter on the Cuyahoga River. The Dorothy Ann-Pathfinder is a Cleveland mainstay, representing the city’s manufacturing backbone and the river’s environmental resurgence. Every February, she’s one of the first ships on the Great Lakes to emerge from winter lay up, working every day to deliver loads of iron ore from the Cleveland Bulk Terminal to the Arcellor-Mittal steel plant 6 miles up the river.
March 25, 2019 - MLive.com
SAULT STE. MARIE, MI - The Great Lakes 2019 navigation season officially kicked off at 12:01 a.m. today, with the first 1,000-footer to ply the inland seas snagging this year’s bragging rights as the first ship through the Soo Locks. The Stewart J. Cort arrived at the lock system just before midnight. Ship enthusiasts had been tracking her progress through the Lower Great Lakes. Fans gathered near the huge lock system in Sault Ste. Marie as the Cort pulled into the Poe Lock, which handles all the big freighters upbound for Lake Superior.
February 27, 2019 - News 5 Cleveland
CLEVELAND — Great pay and benefits, free meals plus room and board all without a college degree. Sounds like a dream job, right? The catch, you need to hop on a freighter ship for weeks and even months at a time and set sail on the Great Lakes. In the middle of winter, the waters of Lake Erie are harsh and unforgiving. Too dangerous to navigate for most. But come spring, once the ice thaws and the air warms up, there will be money to be had on the water. Always has been always will be.
February 24, 2019 - Duluth News Tribune
An apprentice pilot on the Great Lakes, Jason Church hops on numerous international cargo vessels in a given year as he transits the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Seaway out to the Atlantic Ocean as a career. For the past several years, using the digital sobriquet "Captain Jason Church," he's been delivering insight, imagery and videos of the lakes on social media. His Twitter and Instagram timelines offer a vantage point of shipping life once mostly foreign to the public.