Photostory #505: Big Scientific Assualt to Safeguard North America's Fresh Water

Photographers
John Ough
Maker
National Film Board of Canada
Release Date
March 1, 1970
Collection
CMCP fonds
Credit Line
Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography fonds, National Gallery of Canada Library and Archive
Main Text
In progress Photostory 1/13 : As the storms of late winter rage across the deserted interior waters and the land-locked voices of social conscience cry even louder, a group of skilled and dedicated Canadian government scientists is actively pursuing its vital business in the endangered waters of the Great Lakes with increasing vigor. _x000B__x000B_These men and women are the staff of the Canada Centre for Inland Waters at Burlington, Ontario. With their origins in a score of countries, including the U.S.A, Egypt and Germany, these experts in such disciplines as limnogeology and water quality have been gathered together in a daring, carefully-planned assault aimed at arresting the misuse of the nation's most valuable mineral - fresh water. _x000B__x000B_Their task is to study fresh water by probing its physical, biological and chemical properties, and economic and engineering aspects. The effects of floods and droughts are also studied as are practical solutions to current pollution problems. All these avenues of research are being explored with the help of many governmental, academic and industrial agencies and institutions. The staff of 150, soon to increase to 300, will number 1,000 after they move into a new permanent $23,500,000 building complex later this year. At present, the Centre's offices and laboratories are contained in a collection of interconnected trailers situated in the shadow of the Burlington Skyway's centre span. A group venture by three federal departments - Energy, Mines and Resources, National Health and Welfare and the Fisheries Research Board - the Centre is also linked with universities, industry and other groups. It forms the most promising bulwark against the threatening spectre of total ecological pollution. _x000B__x000B_The choice to make Burlington, Ontario, the Centre's headquarters has placed this unique research group in the geographical middle of the largest treasury of fresh water on earth. Contained in the Great Lakes (shared by Canada and the United States as part of a common boundary and a world-renowned waterway for shipping, fisheries and recreation) is enough water to cover all of Canada's 10 provinces and two territories - almost 4,000,000 square miles to a depth of eight feet. Depending on this water are many great cities and agricultural lands containing 40,000,000 people. This huge industrial area is likely to become, in 30 years time, part of the greatest megapolis in the world - stretching from Duluth, Minnesota, past Chicago, Detroit, Toronto, Montreal to Quebec City - 1,000 miles of densely-populated regions depending on plentiful fresh water. _x000B__x000B_Not only concerned with the Great Lakes region, the Canada Centre for Inland Waters carries out research in other inland waters and is engaged on limnological research across the nation to British Columbia. _x000B__x000B_But the big current inquiry is in the Great Lakes and from Burlington sail research vessels that criss-cross these big inland seas on their continuing task of collecting scientific data. A year round job, the ships and boats regularly visit predetermined sampling spots, take water samples, specimens of the lake bottom, cores of the underlying lake bed, the organic materials floating in the water and make a variety of other probes into the properties of the lake. _x000B__x000B_In summer, much of the work is carried out in pleasant conditions, but in winter, when the observations must be continued, the 24-hour observations are often made during trying days of rain, snow and sleet, amid rough seas pushed high by the heavy winds of cold, dense air. _x000B__x000B_For the scientists and technicians, this work on deck is followed by lengthy scientific analysis in a pitching and tossing laboratory built in the holds of a chartered sealing vessel. Later, on shore, the samples are thoroughly studied in a more detailed manner by the staff of the Centre's many laboratories. _x000B__x000B_As the months pass by and several years of exact study are accumulated on these waters, the Canada Centre for Inland Waters will gain knowledge showing the intricate patterns of cause and effect that take place in and around them. This will form the basis of action which will assuredly bring a new and purer era for North America's Great Lakes region.