Frozen Niagara

I am always pleased to share information and images that depict the natural wonder near my birthplace and original hometown, and this weekend I have the perfect opportunity. 

The polar vortex (never sure whether that deserves capital letters) has created a strange phenomenon that only occurs about once every fifty years.  Niagara falls has frozen. Well, let me qualify that.  The American Falls has partially frozen over, though there is still a good flow of water over the brink.  The Horseshoe Falls, the Canadian part of Niagara, has never (to my knowledge) frozen.

Some of the pictures you will see in the two articles I've linked to are not current.  They are from past freezes the dates of which are somewhat controversial, but thought to be 1911 and 1936. On those occasions, whenever they were, people actually walked out on the brink of the American Falls and also walked across the ice bridge in the lower Niagara River between the United States and Canada.  From the pictures provided, it appears that the lower ice bridge is probably solid enough for a hike across, but I wouldn't recommend it.

I kind of favor the second article on Frozen Niagara, because it shows several of the earlier freezes, plus a stock shot of the American Falls as it looks in the summertime.

One of my earlier columns was on the topic, The Day They Shut the Water Off , and concerned the time in the 1960s, when a coffer dam was built above the American Falls and the water reduced to a trickle.  That was done so that a study could be performed to determine whether the huge boulders below the falls could be cleared.  The study found that the clearing would only speed up erosion of the falls, so no project was ever started.

I trust that you enjoyed the pictures, and if you've never visited Niagara Falls, put it on your bucket list.  It is a wonder well worth seeing, frozen or flowing.  It is better to visit in warm weather, though.