History
A trip aboard MS Chi-Cheemaun is a long standing Great Lakes tradition dating back to the 1930s when a small, wooden vessel, Kagawong, first ferried automobiles across the Georgian Bay between Tobermory and South Baymouth. It features a drive-on, drive-off bow and stern loading and unloading through a visored bow system and a square door stern section. The ship is 111 m (364 ft) with a 19 m (62 ft) beam and has capacity for 648 passengers and 143 vehicles, including room for large highway vehicles such as buses and transport trucks.
The ship was initially powered by two Ruston 3500 horsepower (2.6 MW) diesel engines and an 800 horsepower (600 kW) bow thruster engine for improved handling of the vessel at slow speeds. During the 2006–2007 winter layover period, her Ruston engines were replaced with four Caterpillar V8 diesels. The addition of two mezzanine decks in 1982 increased the ship's vehicle carrying capacity to 240.
Like her predecessors on Lake Huron, MS Chi-Cheemaun is owned by Owen Sound Transportation Company Limited, an agency of the Ontario Ministry of Northern Development and Mines, and operated under contract to the Ministry of Transportation.
The ship makes the 40 km (25 mi) trip in about one hour and 45 minutes, four times each day during peak season and twice a day during May and October.
For a short time, from 1989 to 1992, MS Chi-Cheemaun had a sister ship, MS Nindawayma, which ran the same route. However, MS Nindawayma was retired because of service problems leading to public dissatisfaction and now sits rusting in Sault Ste. Marie.
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