• Monday-What'sUP February 11 - 08:08 pm

As of last week's reports, Lake Superior is almost completely frozen over with only around 8% not frozen. Today's photos from Frank Jezek show us the view of the Big Lake from out his windows in Ontonagon.

The ice is covering Superior as far out as the eye can see there in Frank's back yard and it looks a little chunky and bumpy, too. It is frigid and cold and kind of barren looking, but still has a beauty about it that mesmerizes you as you look out at the vastness of the icy covering. It's amazing that the power of Lake Superior can be covered completely with ice like this, calmly waiting for spring to arrive and the frozen mass to let go of its grip on her.

I sort of feel like Lake Superior---FROZEN! great
pics anyway!

The winteriest Winter in quite awhile.

Water services are freezing. A winter that will go down in the record books.

Mary,
Here is link to show ice cover on Superior:
http://www.glerl.noaa.gov/res/glcfs/sicecon-00.gif

Steve Pummill

I made the drive from Munising to Marquette about 2 1/2 weeks
ago, and I could see the powerful waves moving the slushy green
water. Drove it again last week, and it was FROZEN SOLID! It's a
beautiful and entertaining drive, often dangerous, and a different
experience each time. Part of why I love the lake so much.

Great pictures!
Steve, thanks for the link! I have been using this one:

http://coastwatch.glerl.noaa.gov/cwdata/lct/glsea.png

That shows all the lakes.
This will be a Winter to be remembered. As I sit down here in Alabama, we are at this time, experiencing what is considered here to be a snowstorm. At least 4 inches on the ground so far. Nothing at all like what up North gets but even a 1/2 inch down on the ground can stop a small Southern town. This is about the 4th snowfall this Winter that has stuck too! I am loving it as snow is usually scarce here!

I wonder if anyone has ever walked across the big lake say to isle royale? from eagle harbor or copper harbor. maybe a challenge for survivor man. lol

Joe: I don't think that would be a very good idea since the ice cover is continually changing from day to day depending on wind and currents.

Yeah, but if it was easy then anybody could/would do it... Get Survivorman!!

Supposedly happened a few times long ago. Read about it on George Hite's Eagle Harbor site years ago. Some of the residents of Isle Royale made that perilous journey.

Found one the references.
http://www.eagleharborweb.net/archive/update5.htm
Ice Walking(2/22/03)
As I look out across ice stretching to the horizon, I think of the either brave or foolhardy souls who in the days of Isle Royale’s copper mining and timbering boomlet, reportedly walked from the island across the frozen lake to the Keweenaw. One of these men of lore was Eagle Harbor’s Richard Harvey, the great granddaddy of Susan Adams and Becky Markee and founder of The Harvey Boarding House, the beautifully maintained old home that sits kiddy-corner from the Shoreline Resort. Richard's’ s obituary tells of his youthful trek across the ice, with three other lads and two horses, from Isle Royale to Copper Harbor - a distance of over 50 miles! I doubt if they were riding the horses, and given the rough ice they must have encountered, it’s not likely they traveled more than two, perhaps three, miles per hour – meaning they were out on the lake for 17 to 25 hours. In mid winter, all but about nine of those hours in winter darkness. And no satellite photos to assure them the ice was solid. Incredible!