Buffalo

Buffalo was built in 1978, is 634 feet long and flies a U.S. flag

Info
The Buffalo was built in Sturgeon Bay in 1978 for the American Steamship Company of Buffalo. She is known as a river boat; small enough to get to docks that are up river from Great Lakes ports, particularly the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland. When on Lake Superior, she usually loads iron ore pellets for Cleveland, some of which will be dropped at the Cleveland Bulk Terminal. It will then go up the river with the remaining pellets and discharge them at Mittal Steel. Mittal needs a certain amount of pellets that are higher quality and are only dropped once. The pellets discharged at the Bulk Terminal are dropped there and will be picked up later and taken to Mittal where they will be dropped a second time. Only a smaller boat like the Buffalo can load pellets in Silver Bay and go to Cleveland and then up the river to Mittal where they will drop those pellets for only the first time. The larger boats cannot navigate in the river. When not on that run, the Buffalo loads and discharges a variety of cargos in many ports on the Great Lakes, including: Toledo, Harbor Beacon, Port Gypsum, Lorain, Zug Island, Waukegan, South Chicago, Stoneport, River Rogue, Calcite, Muskegon, Alpena, Green Bay, Sandusky, Ludington, St. Joseph, Fairport, Holland, Milwaukee, Manistee, Port Dolomite, Bay City, Conneaut, Burns Harbor, Ashtabula, Windsor, Erie, Saginaw, Cleveland, Nanticoke, Charlevoix, Marblehead, Escanaba, Harbor Beacon, Ferysburg, Benton Harbor, Silver Bay and Duluth.

The Buffalo was launched on March 16, 1978 by American Steamship Company. She has always been called Buffalo. She operates with two General Motors diesel engines. She has both a bow and stern thruster that is additional help for tight situations on rivers and smaller ports.