They Stopped Niagara Falls

Niagara Falls is made up of three waterfalls from the Niagara River. In 1969, the US Army Corps of Engineers stopped the flow of water over one of them, American Falls, to study the stability of the rock underneath. For six months, tourists could walk over the rock bed where the falls had been. Ultimately, the Corps decided that stabilizing the rock bed would not be worth the expense.

Link -via the Presurfer

(Image credit: Flickr user Russ Glasson)

Previously: The falls also stopped flowing in 1848 for natural reasons, and froze completely over in 1911.

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Here is an interesting link that describes the whole thing, pulled from the archives of the Niagara Falls Review: http://www.niagarafrontier.com/dewater.html

It seems that diversion of the water flowing through the American channel wasn't terribly difficult.

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@archibot: Actually, when I clicked the link I was hoping for an explanation of HOW they stopped the falls AND what they did with the water (redirect? how? to where?)

Guess I'll keep wondering.

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Yes that does seem like the only possible explanattion, but nit knowing the layout of the falls I didn't know if even that was possible. But having looked at the google maps image it seems like it would be a relatively simple thing to do.

I also looked up the amount of water involved, 90% of the water flows over the horseshoe side, since they did this in the winter and since the difference between summer time peak volume and winter time low volume is so huge, diverting the American side water would be negligible.

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Just to point out, I don't think any barrel-riders went over the Falls on the American side (at least, not any who lived), since they'd just be dashed on rocks. The Canadian side (the horseshoe) is much more barrel-rider-friendly.

And if I'm mentioning that, I have to mention this amazing account of the kid who went over the Canadian side in a lifejacket in 1960 and lived: http://edoerksen.blogspot.com/2010/07/miracle-of-niagara-falls-50-years-ago.html