Steep Rock Lake
Steep Rock Lake was a body of water near the township of Atikokan, northern Ontario, Canada. It was originally fed by the Seine River.
During World War II, a program was implemented to drain the lake. This diversion of the river allowed open-pit mining of hematite iron ore under the middle arm of the lake by the Inland Steel Company and its subsidiary Caland Ore Canada. By 1949, the site was producing a million tons of ore per year and had an estimated 500 million tons of ore deposits.
This lake was the site of an elaborate UFO hoax in 1950. In 1957, a caribou antler was discovered in the exposed silt. This specimen may have been deposited here by a barren-ground caribou at the end of the last ice age, demonstrating that the species once lived in this region. These caribou are now found much further to the north.
