Found off the coast of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, this perfectly preserved three-masted ship was finally found and filmed.

The Great Lakes Historical Society announced that the wreck of Atlanta had been found. MPR News says the group had been doing sonar passes and found something that appeared to be a ship, so they marked it to come back with cameras.

MPR reports that more than 130 years after it sank in a spring gale, shipwreck hunters have found just off the shores of Michigan in over 600 feet of water. The Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society announced that the wreck of the Atlanta, a three-masted schooner-barge, was located first by sonar, then identified this year using remote video.

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The story is, that Atlanta sank during a storm in 1891. According to The New York Times, the ship was carrying coal and being towed by another vessel. Atlanta sank while being towed from Buffalo, New York, to Duluth, Minnesota.

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The story goes on to say that nine members of the crew boarded a lifeboat and headed to shore, but the weather prevented them from doing so because the lifeboat capsized 200 yards from shore. When spotted by men on shore, they mistook the boat for a tree trunk and never did anything, so only 2 of the crew members survived.

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MSN reports that the sonar searchers say the Atlanta is well-preserved and the searchers were afraid they would find bodies because the cold water sometimes preserves the dead. Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society was surprised at the shape of the boat.

MPR News is reporting that Corey Adkins and Darryl Ertel, director of marine operations for the Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society, was "mowing the lawn" with sonar on Lake Superior last year and because of the close proximity and detailed sweeps, they were able to go after this shipwreck first.

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The society says the ship is sitting at 650 feet deep, so the wreck isn't accessible to divers. For now, the pictures and video of the wreck will have to do. The exciting news is NPR is reporting that the society had found a total of 10 wrecks last year and another five more that have not yet been identified but could be wrecked ships.

So we could be reporting more shipwrecks at the bottom that searchers and shipwreck enthusiasts thought were gone or forgotten.

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