The Queen of the Lakes was originally a 2-masted schooner built in 1853 and later refitted with a 3rd mast in 1887. The ship sank with no lives lost in 1906. For 103 years she sat silently on the bottom of Lake Ontario before shipwreck explorers Jim Kennard and Dan Scoville located her using side scan sonar technology. The duo would later visit the wreck with a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) in 2011.

In September 2018 photographer Jill Heinerth and I had the privilege to be the first visitors to the ship in more than 112 years. The Queen of the Lakes rests in deep water, well outside the limits of recreational scuba divers. To make the dive we utilized closed circuit rebreathers and mixed gasses to safely enjoy about 45 minutes on the bottom. On this dive we were quite fortunate to have experienced warm temperatures on the top layers of the lake, making our lengthy decompression a bit more tolerable. Enjoy some of the outstanding photographs Jill captured of our dive…

Further reading:

Jim Kennard on Shipwreck World

Jill Heinerth article on Into the Planet

 

**The exact location (and depth) of the Queen of the Lakes remains a secret. We strongly feel that releasing any information in regards to location could result in the theft or destruction of artifacts left on the wreck.**