Where is mackenzie river located on a map

Its English name derives from Alexander Mackenzie , the first European to travel the length of the river to its mouth in Inuvialuit occupied a winter village, called Kuukpak, situated near the mouth of the Mackenzie River from the s until the late 19th century, when it was abandoned following epidemics of European-introduced diseases. From Kuukpak, Inuvialuit could hunt caribou and beluga, and take advantage of the abundance of driftwood that floated down the river.

Fish camps that date back hundreds of years were situated on the banks of the main stem of the river. Families harvested fish from the river then moved inland to hunt caribou in the Mackenzie Mountains or on the tundra to the east, as summer changed to fall.

Alexander Mackenzie and John Franklin both visited the fish camps on the river during their travels in and respectively. River fisheries increased in importance with the adoption of dog teams in the early fur trade period, as the main subsistence for the dogs during the winter months was dry fish.

The relative ease of transportation along the Mackenzie River made it the focus of activity by non-Indigenous newcomers including explorers, traders and missionaries. It was just north of Tulita where Imperial Oil employees struck oil in the summer of The Canadian government, needing to secure title to these lands, promptly sent a treaty party north to obtain signatures on what would become Treaty The oil discovery led to the development of a refinery at Norman Wells , which supplied petroleum products to regional industrial operations, including the mines at Port Radium and in Yellowknife beginning in the s.

In this period the federal government also introduced domesticated reindeer to the Mackenzie delta to encourage local economic development particularly as the wild caribou herds had been depleted by whalers in the late 19th century.

Inuvialuit worked with Scandinavian Sami herders who had moved to Canada to care for the animals. The Distributor made two or three round trips each summer from until the late s, when the last stern-wheelers ceased operation on the river. The Distributor carried goods and personnel to the posts, hospitals and missions, as well as children going to northern residential schools. In , construction began on the Canol pipeline to carry crude oil from Norman Wells to Whitehorse , in the Yukon.

Canol was one of several US army projects in the Northwest Territories during the Second World War that sought to ensure continental security and energy security in particular.

Hundreds of American soldiers travelled down the Mackenzie River, which served as a critical transportation artery not only for Canol, but the other military projects as well. Dene also found work on these projects, as they broke trail and guided survey crews.

After the s greater effort was made to construct all-weather highways in the Northwest Territories, although water routes endured into the 21st century. NWT Highway 1 reaches Wrigley on the river and there are winter ice-roads in the delta.

In , the Deh Cho Bridge opened. In , a major oil strike in Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, prompted proposals to create a northern pipeline corridor to carry natural gas from the Arctic Ocean to Alberta , including along the Mackenzie River Valley. These proposals came at a time when Dene leaders were questioning the significance of Treaty 11, leading to their clear assertion, by the early s, that this treaty had not ceded control over northern lands including the Mackenzie River.

The Mackenzie Valley Pipeline Inquiry, led by Thomas Berger, engaged with these issues and more, recommending a year moratorium on pipeline development and triggering a new land claims process. The Dehcho land claim, covering the southernmost part of the Mackenzie River, is still being negotiated.

The land surface area surrounding a river, typically bounded by higher elevations, where all of the rainfall or snowmelt flows into that river. The average volume of water that flows out of the river over a specific unit of time, usually cubic metres per second.

The average is calculated for the entire year, but there are months when flow is naturally higher or lower. The result is a semi-circular, oxbow lake. Numerous oxbow lakes are visible in the large version of the image.

Image of the Day Land Life. In the past few centuries, a river in northwestern Canada stopped wandering and assumed a more direct route to the sea.

Image of the Day Land Water. Image of the Day Land Snow and Ice. EO Explorer. Mackenzie River Delta, Canada. The Mackenzie River system is the second largest river system in the North American continent, after only the Mississippi-Missouri River system. The Mackenzie River system flows along a course of 4, kilometers from its headwaters in the Finlay River to its drainage into the Beaufort Sea in the Arctic Ocean. Though the Mackenzie River itself flows entirely within the boundaries of the Northwest Territories of Canada , many of its tributaries spread out into adjacent Canadian provinces, such as British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Alberta and Yukon.

The Mackenzie River basin was used as an important trade route by European fur traders since the late 18th Century. The river was named after the Scottish explorer Alexander Mackenzie, who explored the river and traveled along its course to reach the Arctic Ocean in Soon thereafter, a large number of trade posts cropped up along the river and its tributaries, and York boats began to ply on the river in the early 19th Century.

These boats were gradually replaced by steamboats, and the fur trade soon flourished along the river. In the early parts of the 20th Century, mining became another economically significant activity around the Mackenzie River Basin, though in the later half of the 20th Century, profits garnered from mining activities there became marginal at best. The Mackenzie River basin is still one of the most sparsely populated, and pristine, habitats of North America.

Through the trapping of animals such as beavers, lynxes, foxes, and martens for fur is still practiced by the indigenous Indians settled along the river, fur trading is no longer a dominant source of economic revenue for this region.