Ship stuck in Welland Canal

The harsh winter weather has jammed the great lakes with ice — and pushed back the shipping season by nearly two weeks. But even with cargo moving now, there’s still plenty of ice to deal with. That was the situation in Port Colborne on Wednesday.

It was tough going through the centre of Port Colborne thanks to a large freighter frozen in the locks.

The bridge was up — but the ship was going nowhere. The 20-thousand ton bulk carrier Federal Nakagawa operated by Montreal based Fednav — had a chunk of bad luck, as it tried to navigate lock eight. The ship — carrying agricultural products — ran aground on a huge chunk of ice that somehow became wedged under its hull. It took several hours before tug boats could manouever into position, and drag the freighter out of the jam.

There seemed to be no serious damage to the ship as shortly after it was freed from the lock. It set sail for Cleveland, Ohio where it’s expected to arrive around early Thursday morning. The government’s Canadian ice service reports that there is a covering of either close ice — or very close ice — still clogging about two thirds of Lake Erie — with mostly open water at the western end of the lake.

So even though the Federal Nakagawa is making progress, it has still been slow progress, and despite today’s beautifully warm weather — there’s still plenty of ice, bobbing around out on the great lakes.