In the summer of 2001, I kayaked solo for 66 days down the Nahanni, Liard, and Mackenzie rivers in Canada’s Northwest Territories.
In the summer of 2001, I kayaked solo for 66 days down the Nahanni, Liard, and Mackenzie rivers in Canada’s Northwest Territories. I saw few signs of human life on the wild Nahanni and the muddy Liard. But once I got to the Mackenzie, which is part of the second longest river system on the continent, I had to make way for tugboats pulling giant barges filled with gas, heating fuel, dry food, and other supplies destined for roadless Indigenous communities downstream of the village of Wrigley, where the Mackenzie Highway, which begins in Alberta, ends. More than once on a cold misty night, I was awoken in my tent by the deafening blast of a tug’s horn.
Nowadays, those horn blasts are far less frequent because the Mackenzie River, which flows northwest to the Arctic Ocean and is part of the second longest river system on the continent, is at times not deep enough to float those barges. In fact, the government-owned company that operates the tugs stopped service altogether this year when it became clear the river would not contain sufficient water — even in late spring, after river ice melted. In June, the Canadian Coast Guard announced its services, including the provision of on-the-water responses and maintenance of aids to navigation, were “impacted” for almost a thousand miles of river.
Read more at: Yale Environment 360
A prefabricated house delivered by barge to the Sahtu village of Tulita in 2022. Recent deliveries have been cancelled because of low water levels on the Mackenzie River. (Photo Credit: Sahtu Secretariat Incorporated)
