Athabasca River
The Athabasca River ( French Rivière Athabasca ; German spelling sometimes Athabaska ; Cree : "where there are reeds") is a 1231 km long river in the Canadian province of Alberta , which belongs to the river system of the Mackenzie River .
It rises in the southwestern part of Alberta from the source streams of the Athabasca Glacier not far from the border with the province of British Columbia in Jasper National Park . The 23 m high waterfall Athabasca Falls is located on its upper course ( ⊙ ). It makes its way in a northeastern direction through the Great Plains until it flows into Lake Athabasca near the Saskatchewan border . The catchment area of the Athabasca covers 153,000 km².
Important tributaries are the Lesser Slave River , which drains the Little Slave Lake , the McLeod River, and the Pembina River .
The river and the Athabasca lake are namesake for the Athabasca oil sands , an oil sand deposit south of the lake and south and east of the river. They are the largest known deposit of unconventional crude oil and are exploited with tremendous energy expenditure and environmental damage.
Between the 1820s and 1840s, the York Factory Express , a Hudson's Bay Company trade route between the York Factory on Hudson Bay and Fort Vancouver , followed the river for some stretches.
Since 1989 the river has been a Canadian Heritage River .
Places on the river
Runoff level
- Athabasca River at gauge near windfall - hydrographic data from R-ArcticNET
- Athabasca River at the gauge near Jasper - hydrographic data from R-ArcticNET
- Athabasca River at the Entrance gauge - hydrographic data from R-ArcticNET
- Athabasca River at the Hinton gauge - hydrographic data from R-ArcticNET
- Athabasca River at the Athabasca gauge - hydrographic data from R-ArcticNET
- Athabasca River at the gauge below McMurray - hydrographic data from R-ArcticNET
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Article Athabasca in the Great Soviet Encyclopedia (BSE) , 3rd edition 1969–1978 (Russian)
- ↑ Athabasca River at gauge near windfall - hydrographic data from R-ArcticNET
- ↑ Athabasca River at the Athabasca gauge - hydrographic data from R-ArcticNET
- ↑ Athabasca River at the gauge below McMurray - hydrographic data from R-ArcticNET
- ↑ Athabasca River at Embarras Airport gauge - hydrographic data from R-ArcticNET
- ↑ The Rivers. Canadian Heritage Rivers System (CHRS), accessed March 23, 2019 .