Chicago sinks ship that Algoma club wanted For The News-Chronicle The "Straits of Mackinac" car ferry, which had been moored for years in the Kewaunee harbor, was sunk April 10 in Lake Michigan, near Chicago. The Chicago Tribune reported workers sunk the 200-foot ship 10 miles northeast of the Navy Pier, where the vessel will act as an artificial reef and recreational site for scuba divers. The "Straits of Mackinac" had previously been a proposed project of the Neptune's Nimrods Dive Club for use as an underwater diving site near Algoma. But, as the vessel awaited its future fate moored inside the Kewaunee harbor, the sale of the Inner Harbor Marina last year changed those plans. A condition of the sale was to remove the ferry from the marina. The club was unable to find another nearby site in a month's time to dock the ferry and was not in a financial position to take responsibility in the event the boat would never be approved for sinking in Wisconsin. That allowed the Tim Early Foundation of Illinois to take over the project to sink the vessel near Chicago. The "Straits of Mackinac" was pulled out of the Kewaunee harbor last June and taken to the Chicago area, where the ferry was prepared for sinking. The ship's sinking hasn't put an end to efforts to place a vessel on the bottom of Lake Michigan for a Kewaunee County dive site. Neptune's Nimrods have been working this spring on obtaining Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources approval to sink a retired fire tug boat about half as long as the ferry. The former Chicago Fire Department tug known as the "Joseph Medill," which the dive club plans to rename the "City of Algoma," is presently moored in Algoma at the Pier 42 Marina.