Allanburg | |
---|---|
Unincorporated community | |
Coordinates: 43°4′35″N79°12′30″W / 43.07639°N 79.20833°W | |
Country | Canada |
Province | Ontario |
Regional municipality | Niagara |
City | Thorold |
Time zone | UTC-5 (EST) |
• Summer (DST) | UTC-4 (EDT) |
Forward sortation area | |
Area codes | 905 and 289 |
NTS Map | 030M03 |
GNBC Code | FEDES |
Allanburg is the capital of the City of Thorold, Ontario, Canada. It is located on the Welland Canal and Highway 20, both important transportation routes through the Niagara Peninsula. The two cross at a [1] vertical-lift bridge, numbered as Bridge 11 by the Saint Lawrence Seaway Authority, but often known simply as the Allanburg Bridge. The collision of the ship Windoc with the bridge made national news in 2001.
The original sod-turning ceremony for the construction of the First Welland Canal took place in the area on November 30, 1824. Today, a cairn at the west approach to the lift bridge commemorates the event.
At approximately 20:54 on August 11, 2001, the bulk carrier vessel Windoc struck the descending Allanburg lift bridge. [1] The ship's wheelhouse and funnel were ripped off in the collision, starting a fire on board. [1] Uncontrollable, the vessel drifted downstream and ran aground 800 m from the bridge. [1] Fire fighting units from throughout Niagara Region were involved in the efforts to put out the fire, parking the fire trucks on the canal's banks. [1]
There was no loss of life. The master and third officer were able to escape the wheelhouse before its destruction. The wheelsman remained in the wheelhouse and survived the collision by lying on the deck until the bridge span passed overhead. [1] The canal reopened to shipping two days later, but the bridge remained locked in a raised position while engineers studied and repaired the structure. Road traffic through central Niagara was left in considerable chaos, as the number of canal crossings is limited. Detours were set up to travel through the Thorold Tunnel north of Allanburg. Eventually, the damage to the bridge was found to be minor and repaired. Windoc has sat in the port of Montreal ever since, inoperable and its bilges flooded. Later, an investigation found that the impaired bridge operator lowered the bridge before the ship had cleared the span. [1]
Welland is a city in the Regional Municipality of Niagara in Southern Ontario, Canada. As of 2021, it had a population of 55,750.
Thorold is a city in Ontario, Canada, located on the Niagara Escarpment. It is also the seat of the Regional Municipality of Niagara. The Welland Canal passes through the city, featuring lock 7 and the Twin Flight Locks.
The Welland Canal is a ship canal in Ontario, Canada, and part of the St. Lawrence Seaway and Great Lakes Waterway. The canal traverses the Niagara Peninsula between Port Weller on Lake Ontario, and Port Colborne on Lake Erie, and was erected because the Niagara River—the only natural waterway connecting the lakes—was unnavigable due to Niagara Falls. The Welland Canal enables ships to ascend and descend the Niagara Escarpment, and has followed four different routes since it opened.
King's Highway 58, commonly referred to as Highway 58, is a provincially maintained highway in the Canadian province of Ontario. The route is divided into two segments with a combined length of 15.5 km (9.6 mi). The southern segment travels from Niagara Regional Road 3, formerly Highway 3, in Port Colborne, to the Highway 58A junction in the southern end of Welland, a distance of 7.2 km (4.5 mi). The northern segment begins at Highway 20 near Allanburg and travels north and west to a large junction with Highway 406 at the St. Catharines – Thorold boundary, a distance of 8.3 km (5.2 mi). An 18.1 km (11.2 mi) gap separates the two segments within Welland and Pelham. The entire route is located within the Regional Municipality of Niagara.
Canada Steamship Lines (CSL) is a shipping company with headquarters in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The business has been operating for well over a century and a half.
Lake freighters, or lakers, are bulk carrier vessels that operate on the Great Lakes of North America. These vessels are traditionally called boats, although classified as ships.
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The Garden City Skyway is a major high-level bridge located in St. Catharines and Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, Canada, that allows the Queen Elizabeth Way (QEW) to cross the Welland Canal without the interruption of a lift bridge. Six lanes of traffic are carried across the bridge, which is 2.2 kilometres (1.4 mi) in length and 40 metres (130 ft) at its tallest point.
The Welland By-pass, completed in 1973, was a massive construction project on the Welland Canal in Ontario, Canada.
Port Robinson is a small community in the southernmost part of Thorold, Ontario, Canada. The community is divided in half by the Welland Canal, as there is no bridge in the immediate vicinity to connect the two halves of the community. In the summer, a small free ferry for pedestrians and cyclists runs across the canal. In the winter, residents must use the bridge on Highway 20, which results in a 13.3 km (8.3 mi) trip to get to the other side.
King's Highway 20, commonly referred to as Highway 20, is a provincially maintained highway in the Canadian province of Ontario. Presently, it is a short 1.9 km (1.2 mi) stub between Highway 58 and Niagara Regional Road 70 in the City of Thorold, but until 1997 it connected Hamilton to Niagara Falls, serving several towns atop the Niagara Escarpment en route.
Windoc was the name of two Great Lakes freighters owned by Canadian shipping company N.M. Paterson & Sons Ltd., with the second ship named in memory of the first in 1986. Both ships suffered similar accidents with lift bridges on the Welland Canal.
Port Weller Dry Docks was a shipbuilder on the Welland Canal at the Lake Ontario entrance. The shipbuilder was founded in 1946 and the site was initially owned by the Government of Canada for storage purchases. The shipyard expanded to include ship repair, and reconstruction work. In 1956, the drydock was sold to the Upper Lakes Shipping Company, which began the construction of vessels at the site. The shipyard twice went insolvent, most recently in 2015. Port Weller Dry Docks was used to build, refit and repair cargo vessels.
The Montrose Swing Bridge is located on the Welland River at the junction with the Queenston Power Canal in the southeast portion of the City of Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada. It was built ca. 1910 to carry the Canada Southern Railway over the river. It is a two-track bridge, although only one track remains in use today. It crosses the river at roughly a 45-degree angle.
The Welland Canal - bridge 13, or as more commonly known locally, the Welland bridge is a vertical lift bridge located in the heart of downtown Welland, Ontario. The bridge crosses an abandoned portion of the Welland Canal known as the Welland Recreational Waterway.
Ryan Leet is an ocean-going salvage/supply tugboat. The tugboat is owned and operated by Offshore Marine Supply Services Inc. Justin Beaune its registered director and owner. The vessel is based in Panama, and operating in the Caribbean. As of 2022 she is used for towing of ships and barges, supply, ship-to-ship fuel transfers and fire and rescue.
MS Windoc was a lake freighter or laker, initially constructed as an ocean-going bulk carrier in West Germany in 1959. Entering service that year as Rhine Ore, the ship was renamed Steelcliffe Hall in 1977 and reconstructed as a laker. In 1988 the laker was renamed Windoc and in 2001, was involved in a collision with a bridge on the Welland Canal which caused the ship to catch fire. The ship was declared a constructive total loss. While undergoing repairs in Ontario, the ship broke free of its moorings and grounded. Later pulled free, the vessel was eventually converted into a barge.
Bridge 11, also known as the Allanburg Bridge, is a vertical-lift bridge over the Welland Canal within the City of Thorold and community of Allanburg, Ontario, Canada. The location was used for the groundbreaking ceremony for the canal. It was constructed and completed in 1930. The bridge carries Hwy 20 connecting Niagara Falls to Fonthill.
Augustus B. Wolvin was a 560 ft (170 m) long Great Lakes freighter that had a 63-year career on the Great Lakes. Augustus B. Wolvin was a product of the American Shipbuilding Company of Cleveland, Ohio. She was built for the Acme Steamship Company of Duluth, Minnesota.
Lake Frampton was a steam cargo ship built in 1918 by American Shipbuilding Company of Lorain for the United States Shipping Board (USSB) as part of the wartime shipbuilding program of the Emergency Fleet Corporation (EFC) to restore the nation's Merchant Marine. The vessel was employed in coastal trade during her career and collided with another steamer, SS Comus, and sank in July 1920 on one of her regular trips with a loss of two men.
At approximately 2054, while proceeding downbound under Bridge 11 in the Welland Canal, at Allanburg, Ontario, the bulk carrier Windoc was struck by the bridge's vertical-lift span, which was lowered before the vessel had passed clear of the bridge structure.