U.S. Coast Guard Cutters Getting Ready to Leave Twin Ports

DULUTH - A group of ice breaking vessels are getting ready to leave the Twin Ports to help with icy conditions on the Great Lakes.

The USCGC Mackinaw along with two smaller vessels were sent from the Soo Locks to help break up thick ice as lakers make their way out of the Twin Ports with some hot commodities.

“They are trying to position all their Coast Guard assets where they're needed most," Adele Yorde from the Duluth Seaway Port Authority said. "Right now the steel mills need iron ore pellets, the utility companies and some of those furnaces need coal, so those are the commodities that we need to move out of the port of Duluth-Superior.”

The Coast Guard vessels will head out Wednesday for Two Harbors where they will start escorting three lakers down to the Soo Locks.