While the failure late last month of one of the Soo Locks didn’t affect July’s shipping numbers, iron ore cargos carried by U.S.-flag Great Lakes ships fell again, the Lake Carriers’ Association reported last week.

Loadings totaled 4.7 million tons in July, a decrease of 10 percent compared to a year ago. The slump comes on the heels of a 10 percent decrease in June.

The Lake Carriers’ Association, based near Cleveland, in a news release blamed the downturn on a nation “awash in dumped foreign steel.”

The failure of the MacArthur Lock at Sault Ste. Marie, Mich., on July 29 did not play a major role in the month’s totals, the association said, but six U.S.-flag lakers and 250,000 tons of cargo were delayed for about 13 hours between the lock’s closure and midnight July 31. The lock reopened Aug. 17.

In total, 79 U.S.-flag lakers and 1.9 million tons of cargo were delayed for about 160 hours during the 20-day closure.

Total cargo movement in U.S. hulls totaled 10.9 million tons in July, a decrease of 4 percent compared to a year ago.

U.S.-flag lakers’ coal float increased 6.4 percent in July, but shipments of limestone dipped by 5.6 percent. The stone trade also is feeling the affects of unfair trade in steel, the Lake Carriers’ Association reported, as steel production is the primary driver behind demand for fluxstone and metallurgical stone.

Year-to-date, U.S.-flag carriage stands at 42.5 million tons, an increase of

10.7 percent compared to a year ago. Iron ore, coal and limestone all have registered increases over their end-of-July totals in 2014, but those increases in part reflect the catastrophic ice conditions that prevailed for the first five months of 2014, the association said in its news release. Heavy ice so delayed the resumption of the ore trade in March 2014 that at least one steelmaker had to curtail production, and transit times did not become routine until early May. The ice was formidable again this spring, but had largely cleared by late April.

The Lake Carriers’ Association represents 16 American companies that operate 56 U.S.-flag vessels on the Great Lakes.