Wreck diving in Lake Erie

Diving Lake Erie wrecks is dangerous: cold water, poor visibility, depth, entanglement and boat traffic. Nothing here is dive guidance or a dive position. Dive only with proper training, a qualified operator and current information from the groups that maintain moorings.

This site tells the stories of Lake Erie's wrecks; it does not publish dive positions, and nothing here is dive guidance. Moorings and position information come from the volunteer groups that maintain them and from the official sources below, and wrecks are protected by law on every shore.

Who maintains moorings and site information

In Ohio, the Maritime Archaeological Survey Team (MAST) places permitted moorings seasonally on eleven shipwrecks in Ohio's waters, and Ohio Sea Grant publishes a shipwreck trail with approximate positions that it says are not for navigation. In the eastern basin, the Lake Erie Mooring Project publishes, on the Niagara Divers Association's website, a list of the wrecks where its volunteers have installed moorings. Save Ontario Shipwrecks and its Niagara chapter work to document and preserve wrecks in Ontario's waters.

• MAST mooring buoy project
• Lake Erie Mooring Project
• Save Ontario Shipwrecks
• S.O.S. Niagara
• Ohio Sea Grant shipwreck trail

Checked October 4, 2026: the MAST page states "eleven shipwrecks", placed seasonally. These groups are linked for information; they are not connected with this site.

The law

Look, don't take. Shipwrecks and everything on them are protected by law; removing or disturbing anything can be a crime.

• United States: under the Abandoned Shipwreck Act (43 U.S.C. § 2105) the U.S. claims title to abandoned shipwrecks embedded in a state's submerged lands, or resting on them and eligible for the National Register, and transfers that title to the state.
• Ohio: R.C. 1506.32 requires a permit from the Director of Natural Resources, approved by the Ohio History Connection, to recover, alter, salvage or destroy abandoned property on, in or near a submerged watercraft or aircraft in Lake Erie.
• Michigan: MCL 324.76107 forbids recovering, altering or destroying abandoned property on Great Lakes bottomlands without a joint state permit; penalties run from a misdemeanor to a felony punishable by up to 10 years.
• New York: Education Law § 233 makes it a class A misdemeanor to investigate, excavate, remove, injure or destroy objects of historical or archaeological interest on, in or under state-owned lands without the written permission of the Commissioner of Education.
• Pennsylvania: title to abandoned shipwrecks in Pennsylvania's part of Lake Erie passes to the Commonwealth under the federal Abandoned Shipwreck Act, and state permission is required to disturb them.
• Ontario: under the Ontario Heritage Act no one may alter a marine archaeological site or remove an artifact from it without a provincial licence; fines for breaking this rule can reach $1,000,000.

Ontario: the Atlantic and other Ontario sites are monitored, and any work on a marine archaeological site needs a provincial licence.

How Lake Erie wrecks are protected

Why we round positions

Positions on this site are rounded to two decimal places, about a kilometer, and only appear where a reusable public source gives them. We never sell coordinates. That keeps the stories open to everyone without turning the site into a dive-site directory.

Positions and depths are approximate. NOT FOR NAVIGATION. Use current official charts.