Buffalo is the second-largest city in the U.S. state of New York and the seat of Erie County. It is at the eastern end of Lake Erie, at the head of the Niagara River, and is across the Canadian border from Southern Ontario. With a population of 278,349 according to the 2020 census, Buffalo is the 76th-largest city in the United States. The city and nearby Niagara Falls together make up the two-county Buffalo–Niagara Falls Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA), which had an estimated population of 1.1 million in 2020, making it the 49th largest MSA in the United States. Buffalo is in Western New York, which is the largest population and economic center between Boston and Cleveland.
The Erie Canal is a canal that traverses east–west through upstate New York, eastern United States, as part of the cross-state route of the New York State Canal System. It was built to create a navigable water route from the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes Basin, originally stretching for 584 kilometres (363 mi) from the Hudson River at Albany to Lake Erie in Buffalo. Completed in 1825, it was the second-longest canal in the world and greatly enhanced the development and economy of many major cities of New York, including New York City, Albany, Syracuse, Rochester and Buffalo, as well as the United States. This was in part due to the new ease of transporting salt and other necessity goods, and industries that developed around those.
The Great Lakes, also called the Great Lakes of North America or the Laurentian Great Lakes, are a series of large interconnected freshwater lakes with certain sea-like characteristics in the mid-east region of North America that connect to the Atlantic Ocean via the Saint Lawrence River. They are Lakes Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie, and Ontario and are in general on or near the Canada–United States border. Hydrologically, lakes Michigan and Huron are a single body joined at the Straits of Mackinac. The Great Lakes Waterway enables modern travel and shipping by water among the lakes.
Lake Erie is the fourth largest lake of the five Great Lakes in North America and the eleventh-largest globally. It is the southernmost, shallowest, and smallest by volume of the Great Lakes and therefore also has the shortest average water residence time. At its deepest point Lake Erie is 210 feet (64 m) deep.
Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is surrounded on the north, west, and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, and on the south and east by the U.S. state of New York, whose water boundaries meet in the middle of the lake.
Niagara Falls is a group of three waterfalls at the southern end of Niagara Gorge, spanning the border between the province of Ontario in Canada and the state of New York in the United States. The largest of the three is Horseshoe Falls, also known as the Canadian Falls, which straddles the international border of the two countries. The smaller American Falls and Bridal Veil Falls lie within the United States. Bridal Veil Falls is separated from Horseshoe Falls by Goat Island and from American Falls by Luna Island, with both islands situated in New York.
Fort Erie is a town on the Niagara River in the Niagara Region, Ontario, Canada. It is directly across the river from Buffalo, New York and is the site of Old Fort Erie which played a prominent role in the War of 1812.
The Welland Canal is a ship canal in Ontario, Canada, connecting Lake Ontario and Lake Erie. It forms a key section of the St. Lawrence Seaway and Great Lakes Waterway. Traversing the Niagara Peninsula from Port Weller in St. Catharines to Port Colborne, it enables ships to ascend and descend the Niagara Escarpment and bypass Niagara Falls. It is the fourth canal connecting these waterways; three smaller predecessors also bore the same name.
An icebreaker is a special-purpose ship or boat designed to move and navigate through ice-covered waters, and provide safe waterways for other boats and ships. Although the term usually refers to ice-breaking ships, it may also refer to smaller vessels, such as the icebreaking boats that were once used on the canals of the United Kingdom.
The blizzard of 1977 hit Western New York and Southern Ontario from January 28 to February 1. Daily peak wind gusts ranging from 46 to 69 mph were recorded by the National Weather Service in Buffalo, with snowfall as high as 100 in (254 cm) recorded in areas, and the high winds blew this into drifts of 30 to 40 ft. There were 23 total storm-related deaths in Western New York, with five more in northern New York.
The Niagara Queen II is a small icebreaker that Ontario Power Generation uses to keep the inlet ports open at their plant on the Niagara River at Niagara Falls.
USS Niagara, commonly called the US Brig Niagara or the Flagship Niagara, is a wooden-hulled snow-brig that served as the relief flagship for Oliver Hazard Perry in the Battle of Lake Erie during the War of 1812. As the ship is certified for sail training by the United States Coast Guard, she is also designated SSV Niagara. Niagara is usually docked behind the Erie Maritime Museum in downtown Erie in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania as an outdoor exhibit for the museum. She also often travels the Great Lakes during the summer, serving as an ambassador of Pennsylvania when not docked. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973 and was designated the official state ship of Pennsylvania by the Pennsylvania General Assembly in 1988.
The Welland Canal has gone through many incarnations in its history. Today, five distinct canal-construction efforts are recognized. The retronym First Welland Canal is applied to the original canal, constructed from 1824 to 1829 and 1831 to 1833.
The October 2006 Buffalo storm was an unusual early-season lake effect snow storm that hit the Buffalo, New York area and other surrounding areas of the United States and Canada, from the afternoon of Thursday, October 12 through the morning of Friday, October 13, 2006. It was called Lake Storm Aphid by the National Weather Service office in Buffalo, in accordance with their naming scheme for lake-effect snowstorms for that year, which related to insects, though locals never used that terminology and have simply referred to it as the October Surprise or the October Storm or Arborgeddon. The October Surprise was most recently documented in a collection of narratives, historical and meteorological insight, and the adventures of the local NFL team, the Buffalo Bills, as they had to travel to Detroit in spite of the destruction from the storm, entitled Thunder Snow of Buffalo.
CCGS John G. Diefenbaker is the name for a Canadian Coast Guard icebreaker that had been expected to join the fleet by 2017 but has been significantly delayed. Her namesake, John G. Diefenbaker, was Canada's 13th prime minister. It was Diefenbaker's government that founded the Canadian Coast Guard in 1962.
William H. Latham was a senior engineer with the New York Power Authority.
Canadian Coast Guard Ship Griffon is a Canadian Coast Guard (CCG) high endurance multi-tasked vessel and light icebreaker stationed in Prescott, Ontario, Canada. Completed in 1970, Griffon provides icebreaking services along eastern Lake Ontario and upriver along the Saint Lawrence River to Montreal.
MSV Botnica is a multipurpose offshore support vessel and icebreaker built by Finnyards in Rauma, Finland, in 1998. She was the newest and technically most advanced state-owned icebreaker of Finland until 2012, when she was sold to the Port of Tallinn for 50 million euro. Botnica is used as an escort icebreaker in the Baltic Sea during the winter months, but carries out subsea and offshore construction works worldwide during the open water season.
William Latham may refer to:
The Christopher Wheatley is a fireboat delivered to the Chicago Fire Department in 2011. When she was delivered in April 2011, she was the first new fireboat to serve the city in sixty years. She replaced the Victor L. Schlaeger.
