Season in numbers
2024 season
14,246 recorded chokepoint passages by 135 distinct vessels across 7 chokepoints.
- 14,246 Passages Calendar year, UTC buckets
- 135 Distinct vessels
- 39.0 Passages per day Averaged across the whole year, closures included
What this count is and is not. A "passage" is one crossing of one of the 7 monitored gate lines, not a cargo, a voyage, or a lockage. A single round trip from Duluth to Detroit generates several. These totals describe traffic across the monitored lines and should not be read as tonnage, revenue, or the total number of ships working the lakes.
First and last through the Soo
Season opening (observed): Joseph L Block, upbound at Soo Locks (St. Marys River) — 22 Mar 2024, 15:50 EDT.
Season close (observed): American Mariner, downbound at Soo Locks (St. Marys River) — 16 Jan 2025, 03:43 EST.
Season boundaries are inferred from the winter gap in the passage record, a fortnight or more with nothing through the Soo, rather than from the Corps' published opening and closing dates. The two do not always agree.
Traffic by chokepoint
Traffic by fleet
Fleet totals group by the operator on the FreighterLog roster. Hulls with no fleet match, salties and unaffiliated boats among them, are counted together rather than dropped.
Busiest vessels
| # | Vessel | Operator | Passages |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Paul R Tregurtha | The Interlake Steamship Company | 276 |
| 2 | Lee A Tregurtha | The Interlake Steamship Company | 263 |
| 3 | American Century | American Steamship Company | 252 |
| 4 | Joyce L Vanenkevort | VanEnkevort Tug & Barge | 244 |
| 5 | Edwin H Gott | Great Lakes Fleet | 237 |
| 6 | Indiana Harbor | American Steamship Company | 237 |
| 7 | H Lee White | No fleet match | 234 |
| 8 | John G Munson | Great Lakes Fleet | 234 |
| 9 | Clyde S van Enkevort | VanEnkevort Tug & Barge | 232 |
| 10 | Walter J McCarthy Jr | American Steamship Company | 224 |