Manicouagan Reservoir#Geography

File:Manicouagan Reservoir in winter by Sentinel-2.jpg

The reservoir is located in Manicouagan Regional County Municipality in the Côte-Nord region of Quebec, Canada,{{cite Earth Impact DB | name = Manicouagan| linkname = presqu%27ile | access-date = 2009-08-19}} about {{convert|300|km|abbr=on}} north of the city of Baie-Comeau, although its northernmost part is located in Caniapiscau Regional County Municipality. Quebec Route 389 passes the eastern shore of the lake.

The crater is a multiple-ring structure about {{convert|100|km|-1|abbr=on}} across, with the reservoir at its {{convert|70|km|-1|abbr=on}} diameter inner ring being its most prominent feature. It surrounds an inner island plateau called René-Levasseur Island and Mount Babel is the highest peak of the island, at {{Convert|952|m|0|abbr=on}} above sea level and {{Convert|590|m|0|abbr=on}} above the reservoir level. The Louis-Babel Ecological Reserve makes up the central part of the island. The large bay on the eastern shore of the island is named Memory Bay.

{{Infobox terrestrial impact site

| name = Manicouagan Reservoir impact structure

| other_name =

| photo =

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| confidence = Confirmed

| diameter = * {{cvt|100|km||}} (originally)

• {{convert|72|km|abbr=on}} (visible today)

| depth =

| age = 214 ± 1 Ma

| exposed =

| drilled =

| imp_size = {{cvt|5|km|abbr=on|1}}

| bolide =

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}}

Manicouagan Reservoir lies within the remnant of an ancient, deeply eroded impact crater (Impact structure). The crater was formed following the impact of an asteroid with a diameter of {{convert|5|km|abbr=on|0}}, which excavated a crater originally about {{convert|100|km|abbr=on}} wide, although erosion and deposition of sediments have since reduced the visible diameter to about {{convert|72|km|abbr=on}}. It is the Earth's sixth-largest confirmed impact structure according to rim-to-rim diameter.{{cite web|title=Impact Structures listed by Diameter (Increasing) |url=http://www.passc.net/EarthImpactDatabase/New%20website_05-2018/Diametersort.html|publisher=PASSC|access-date=30 January 2020}} Mount Babel is interpreted as the central peak of the crater, formed by post-impact uplift.

1992 radiometric dating has estimated that impact melt within the impact structure has an age of 214 ± 1 million years. A later estimate found an age of 215.4 ± 0.16 Ma.{{Cite journal |last1=Jaret |first1=Steven J. |last2=Hemming |first2=Sidney R. |last3=Rasbury |first3=E. Troy |last4=Thompson |first4=Lucy M. |last5=Glotch |first5=Timothy D. |last6=Ramezani |first6=Jahandar |last7=Spray |first7=John G. |date=2018-11-01 |title=Context matters – Ar–Ar results from in and around the Manicouagan Impact Structure, Canada: Implications for martian meteorite chronology |url=https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0012821X18304758 |journal=Earth and Planetary Science Letters |language=en |volume=501 |pages=78–89 |doi=10.1016/j.epsl.2018.08.016 |bibcode=2018E&PSL.501...78J |s2cid=134725972 |issn=0012-821X|url-access=subscription }} As this is more than 12 million years before the end of the Triassic, the impact that produced the crater cannot have been the cause of the Triassic–Jurassic extinction event.{{cite journal|first=J.P.|last=Hodych|author2=G.R.Dunning|title=Did the Manicouagan impact trigger end-of-Triassic mass extinction?|journal=Geology|volume=20|issue=1|date=1992|pages=51.54|doi=10.1130/0091-7613(1992)020<0051:DTMITE>2.3.CO;2|bibcode = 1992Geo....20...51H }}Ramezani, J., S. A. Bowring, M. S. Pringle, F. D. Winslow, III, and E. T. Rasbury (2005). "The Manicouagan impact melt rock: a proposed standard for intercalibration of U-Pb and 40Ar/39Ar isotopic systems". 15th V.M. Goldsmidt Conference Abstract Volume, p. A321.

It was suggested that the Manicouagan crater may have been part of a multiple impact event, similar to the well-observed string of impacts of Comet Shoemaker–Levy 9 on Jupiter in 1994.{{Cite news | last = Steele | first = Diana | title = Crater chain points to impact of fragmented comet | newspaper = University of Chicago Chronicle | date = 19 March 1998 | url = http://chronicle.uchicago.edu/980319/craters.shtml }} The theory suggests this event also formed the Rochechouart impact structure in France, the Saint Martin crater in Manitoba, the Obolon' crater in Ukraine, and the Red Wing crater in North Dakota;{{cite journal |last1=Spray |first1=John G. |last2=Kelley |first2=Simon P. |last3=Rowley |first3=David B. |title=Evidence for a late Triassic multiple impact event on Earth |journal=Nature |date=1998 |volume=392 |issue=6672 |pages=171–173 |doi=10.1038/32397|bibcode=1998Natur.392..171S |s2cid=4413688 }} however, more recent work has found that the craters formed many millions of years apart, with the Saint Martin crater dating to 227.8 ± 1.1 Ma,{{Cite journal|last1=Schmieder|first1=Martin|last2=Jourdan|first2=Fred|last3=Tohver|first3=Eric|last4=Cloutis|first4=Edward A.|date=November 2014|title=40Ar/39Ar age of the Lake Saint Martin impact structure (Canada) – Unchaining the Late Triassic terrestrial impact craters|url=https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0012821X14005445|journal=Earth and Planetary Science Letters|language=en|volume=406|pages=37–48|doi=10.1016/j.epsl.2014.08.037|bibcode=2014E&PSL.406...37S |url-access=subscription}} while the Rochechouart structure formed 206.92 ± 0.20/0.32 Ma.{{Cite journal|last1=Cohen|first1=Benjamin E.|last2=Mark|first2=Darren F.|last3=Lee|first3=Martin R.|last4=Simpson|first4=Sarah L.|date=August 2017|title=A new high-precision 40 Ar/ 39 Ar age for the Rochechouart impact structure: At least 5 Ma older than the Triassic-Jurassic boundary|journal=Meteoritics & Planetary Science|language=en|volume=52|issue=8|pages=1600–1611|doi=10.1111/maps.12880|bibcode=2017M&PS...52.1600C |s2cid=3521507 |doi-access=free|hdl=10023/10787|hdl-access=free}}

{{Main|Daniel-Johnson dam}}

File:DanielJohnsonDam01.png

The Manicouagan Reservoir as it presently exists was created in the 1960s, by flooding the earlier Lake Mushalagan (Mouchalagan) to the west of the central plateau and then-smaller Manicouagan to the east, by construction of the Daniel-Johnson dam.{{cite web|url=http://craterexplorer.ca/manicouagan-impact-structure/ |title=Manicouagan Impact Structure |website=Crater Explorer |access-date=25 April 2017}} The works were part of the enormous Manicouagan or Manic series of hydroelectric projects undertaken by Hydro-Québec, the provincial electrical utility. The complex of dams is also called the Manic-Outardes Project because the rivers involved are the Manicouagan and the Outardes.

The reservoir acts as a giant headpond for the Manicouagan River, feeding the Jean-Lesage generating station (Manic-2), René-Lévesque generating station (Manic-3), and Daniel-Johnson Dam (Manic-5) generating stations downstream. In the peak period of the winter cold, the lake surface is usually lower, since the turbines run all the time at peak load to meet the huge electrical heating needs of the province. The surface of the lake also experiences low levels in the extreme periods of heat in New England during the summer, since in that period Hydro-Québec sells electrical energy to the joint New England grid and individual utilities in the United States.

{{stack|{{Portal|Canada|Water|Renewable energy}}}}

• Manicouagan Uapishka Biosphere Reserve
• List of impact structures on Earth
• Wembo-Nyama ring structure

{{reflist}}

{{Commons category|Manicouagan Reservoir}}

• [http://www.passc.net/EarthImpactDatabase/New%20website_05-2018/Manicouagan.html Manicouagan] at Earth Impact Database
• [http://craterexplorer.ca/manicouagan-impact-structure/ Manicouagan Impact Structure] at Crater Explorer
• {{cite web|last=Rowley|first=David|title=Paleogeographic Atlas Project: Pictures|url=http://geosci.uchicago.edu/~rowley/Craters.html|work=Paleogeographic Atlas Project|publisher=University of Chicago|access-date=14 June 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070618112435/http://geosci.uchicago.edu/~rowley/Craters.html|archive-date=18 June 2007}}
• {{APOD |date=13 December 2000 |title=Manicouagan Impact Crater on Earth }}
• [https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap190502.html Manicouagan Impact Crater from Space (2019 May 2)]
• [https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap180529.html Aurora and Manicouagan Crater from the Space Station (2018 May 29)]

{{Impact cratering on Earth}}

Category:Impact craters of Quebec

Category:Triassic impact craters

Category:Manicouagan-Outardes hydroelectric project

Category:Reservoirs in Quebec

Category:Biosphere reserves of Canada

Category:Lakes of Côte-Nord

Category:Impact crater lakes