Coral Harbour, is a small Inuit community that is located on Southampton Island, Kivalliq Region, in the Canadian territory of Nunavut. Its name is derived from the fossilized coral that can be found around the waters of the community which is situated at the head of South Bay. The name of the settlement in Inuktitut is Salliq, sometimes used to refer to all of Southampton Island. The plural Salliit, means large flat island in front of the mainland.
History
The Sadlermiut whose name is derived from Salliq previously occupied the area. The Sadlermiut are thought to be the last vestige of the Tuniit. The Tuniit, a pre-Inuit culture, officially went ethnically and culturally extinct in 1902-03 when a Western illness killed all of the Sallirmiut in a matter of weeks. However, others believe that the Sadlermiut were in fact descendants of the Thule, whose geographically isolated culture would have developed idiosyncratically from the mainland Thule culture. A third theory indicates that the Sadlermiut did not necessarily belong to either group, but because of intermarriage, their roots may have in fact been part of both Dorset and Thule cultures. At the beginning of the 20th century, the area was repopulated by Aivilingmiut, whose name was to be later adapted for the Aivilik electoral district, from the Repulse Bay and Chesterfield Inlet areas, influenced to do so by whalerCaptain George Comer and others. Baffin Islanders arrived 25 years later. John Ell, who as a young child travelled with his mother Shoofly on Comer's schooners, eventually became the most famous of Southampton Island's re-settled population.
The community has been served by the Qiniq network since 2005. Qiniq is a fixed wireless service to homes and businesses, connecting to the outside world via a satellite backbone. The Qiniq network is designed and operated bySSI Micro. In 2017, the network was upgraded to 4G LTE technology, and 2G-GSM for mobile voice.
Manitok Thompson, former member of the Legislative Assembly of Nunavut for Rankin Inlet South/Whale Cove, and prior to division, of the Legislative Assembly of the Northwest Territories for Aivilik. She was Nunavut's first female cabinet minister.
Climate
Coral Harbour has a severe subarctic climate, for which it just qualifies due to its July means. It is a borderline polar climate, which results in barren vegetation. Coral Harbour has never gone above freezing in January, February and March (although the latter has recorded. Due to the frozen nature of Hudson Bay, there is a severe seasonal lag until June in spite of lots of sunshine and perpetual twilight during nights. Due to the drop of solar strength and the absence of warm water even in summer, temperatures still drop off very fast as September approaches, with only July and August having ever recorded temperatures above. Cold extremes are severe, but in line with many areas even farther south in Canada's interior. Unlike those areas, Coral Harbour remains beneath in terms of average high in the midst of winter. Throughout December 2010 and early January 2011, Nunavut, northern Quebec and western Greenland set many high temperature records. In Coral Harbour, a high of in mid-December broke the old record of set in 1963. The daily minimum temperature on 6 January 2011, was about warmer than normal. The unusual warmth was due largely to an unseasonal area of high pressure over Greenland, and very negative values of the Arctic oscillation and North Atlantic oscillation. Mostly in the 21st century, the conditions have combined to produce an Arctic dipole anomaly that brings warm air to the Arctic regions and cold air to the continents.
Geological resources
The limestones around Coral Harbour predominantly have a "Low Purity" value for industrial use.
