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Niagara
Falls
Niagara falls which is located in east central portion of
North America. Getting more specific it is located on the Niagara
River, in western New York and southeastern Ontario. Niagara
Falls consists of two primary cataracts of waterfalls: the
Horseshoe, or Canadian, Falls (54 m/176 ft high), Niagara Falls is a great tourist attraction, luring millions
of visitors each year. The falls may be viewed from parks located
on either side of the river, from observation towers, from boats,
from Goat Island, and from the Rainbow Bridge, located a short
distance downstream. Visitors also may enter the Cave of the
Winds, situated behind a curtain of falling water near the base
of the American Falls. Samuel de Champlain, a French explorer,
probably visited Niagara Falls in 1613. Father Louis Hennepin, a
Flemish monk, is known to have visited the waterfall in 1678; he
later published an eyewitness description of it. The Niagara's
large volume of flow, averaging about 5520 cu m (about 194,940 cu
ft) per second, plus its steep drop, give the river great power
potential.
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on
the Canadian side of the river, and the American Falls (55 m/182
ft high), on the United States side. These two cataracts are
seperated by Goat Island, New York. The crestline of the
crescent-shaped Horseshoe Falls, which carries about nine times
more water than the U.S. cataract, is about 640 m (about 2100 ft)
long, and the fairly straight crest of the American Falls
measures 328 m (1075 ft). A small section of the American Falls
near Goat Island is also known as Bridal Veil Falls. Niagara
Falls was formed about 12,000 years ago, when glaciers retreated
north, allowing water from Lake Erie to flow over the Niagara
Escarpment, a ridge that extends in an arc across the northern
Great Lakes region, from Wisconsin to New York. Since that time,
erosion has slowly pushed the waterfall about 11 km (about 7 mi)
upstream, forming the Niagara Gorge. At present the Horseshoe
Falls is receding at an average yearly rate of about 1.5 m (about
5 ft), and the American Falls is being cut away at an annual pace
of about 15 cm (about 6 in). The Horseshoe Falls erodes at a
faster rate mainly because it carries more water. In 1954 a
considerable portion of the American
Falls broke off, creating a large talus, or rock slope, at the
base of the cataract. In order to study ways of preventing
further rockfalls and to remove some of the talus, the American
Falls was successfully "shut off" for several months in
1969 by a dam that was constructed between the U.S. mainland and
Goat Island. 
The waterpower
probably was tapped first in 1757, when Daniel Chabert Joncaire
built a sawmill on the upper river. In 1853 work started on a
hydraulic canal to divert the waters of the upper river to drive
machinery in mills and factories situated below Niagara Falls. In
1875 the first flour mill powered by the canal water was opened,
and in 1881 the first hydroelectric generator was installed along
the waterway. The first large-scale hydroelectric facility, the
Edward Dean Adams Power Plant, was opened on the U.S. side in
1896.
capacity, with associated pumped-storage
facility, 2,400,000 kw) near Lewiston, New York. Both projects,
each located about 6 km (about 4 mi) below Niagara Falls, are
driven by water diverted just above the falls and conveyed by
underground conduits and canals to turbines. Much of the
hydroelectricity is consumed by industries in the nearby cities
of Niagara Falls, New York, and Niagara Falls, Ontario.
