Image Credit: Partnerships BC
September 05, 2023 - 7:00 PM
Okanagan Lake is the ninth deepest lake in all of Canada and the largest lake in the Okanagan.
At its maximum depth it can submerge the Great Pyramid of Giza one and a half times.
It's much longer than it is wide, coming in at around 120 kilometres in length and only ranging between three to five kilometres in width, according to the Canadian Encyclopedia.
It's also very, very deep.
The average depth of the lake is 76 metres which, for reference, is only 17 metres shorter than the Statue of Liberty, which comes in at 93 metres in height, according to Britannica.
The lake's deepest point is 230 metres, which means it could submerge a 70-storey skyscraper or the Statue of Liberty stacked on top of itself two and a half times.
READ MORE: Why the Okanagan Lake bridge has to float
The lake’s varying depths are the result of a deglaciation period that happened in the region 10,000 years ago.
Former glaciers melted, leaving large amounts of sediments to sink to the bottom of the water in an irregular pattern.
“If the sediment were to be completely removed down to the bedrock, the depth of the resulting valley, from bedrock to the top of the surrounding plateaus, would exceed the depth of the Grand Canyon in Arizona," David Barrett with The Canadian Encyclopedia said.
The soft sediments along the bottom of the lake are also the reason why the Okanagan Lake bridge was made as a floating construction.
If abutments had been placed on the unstable surface material, there would have been a huge risk of liquefaction if an earthquake had occurred. This means the bridge would have ripped out the ground from beneath it.
READ MORE: From Kelowna to Kamloops, Interior lakes hold underwater mysteries
The Ogopogo statue near Paul's Tomb
Image Credit: SUBMITTED/Kevin Aschhoff
Diving is a popular activity in the Okanagan Lake with many divers venturing to find some of the famous sunken artefacts.
These include a large Ogopogo statue, a 100-year-old milk truck, the old Okanagan bridge and a Canadian Railway Barge.
To contact a reporter for this story, email Georgina Whitehouse or call 250-864-7494 or email the editor. You can also submit photos, videos or news tips to the newsroom and be entered to win a monthly prize draw.
We welcome your comments and opinions on our stories but play nice. We won't censor or delete comments unless they contain off-topic statements or links, unnecessary vulgarity, false facts, spam or obviously fake profiles. If you have any concerns about what you see in comments, email the editor in the link above. SUBSCRIBE to our awesome newsletter here.
News from © iNFOnews, 2023