Etobicoke Creek
Etobicoke Creek is a river in the Greater Toronto Area of Ontario, Canada. It is a tributary of Lake Ontario and runs from Caledon to southern Etobicoke, part of the City of Toronto. The creek is within the jurisdiction of the Toronto and Region Conservation Authority. Etymology. The name "Etobicoke" was derived from the Mississauga word "wah-do-be-kang" ("wadoopikaang"), meaning "place where the alders grow", which was used to describe the area between Etobicoke Creek and the Humber River. The first provincial land surveyor, Augustus Jones, also spelled it as "ato-be-coake". A letter from  January 22, 1775 uses "Tobacock". Etobicoke was adopted as the official name of the township (later city, now part of the city of Toronto) in 1795 on the direction of Lieutenant Governor John Graves Simcoe. The name for the waterway used in the Toronto Purchase treaty was Etobicoke River. Simcoe in a memo from April 5, 1796 refers to it as "Smith River or Etobicoke". In a letter dated April 9, 1796 he used "Tobicoke". (No reference appears for Smith but could be linked to Samuel Smith who would be granted land in Etobicoke and served with Simcoe in the  Queen's Rangers.) Both "creek" and "river" appear in newspapers and books until about 1960. "Creek" was officially adopted by the Geographical Names Board of Canada on November 18, 1962, though it existed far earlier. The name of the river in Anishinaabemowin (Ojibwe) language of the Mississaugas, in modern Fiero orthography is "Edoopikaag-ziibi". Course. Etobicoke Creek begins south of the Oak Ridges Moraine and flows through Caledon, Brampton, and Mississauga — west of the Toronto Pearson International Airport and the surrounding industrial area — to its mouth at Lake Ontario in the Etobicoke portion of the city of Toronto. The length  of the creek is . Watershed. The creek's southern section forms a city and county-level boundary, separating Toronto on the east from Mississauga, in Peel Region, as far north as Eglinton Avenue (north of where it flows entirely through Peel), on the west. The watershed encompasses . Mean summer waterflow has increased over the period 1967 to 2006 from 3.5 m/s to 5.0 m/s as recorded at a measuring station near the river mouth at the Queen Elizabeth Way. The creek ends in a large recreational area, Marie Curtis Park. It is surrounded by cliffs and the bottom  is solid stone, often covered with smaller rocks. It is full of small fish and crayfish, a sign of purity of water. Geology. The creek is characterized by winding paths ravines and shale banks. Incidents. Aircraft accidents. A section of Etobicoke Creek runs close to Toronto's Pearson International Airport, leaving a ravine very close to the west ends of runways 24L and 24R or the beginnings of Runways 6R & 6L. There have been two major aircraft incidents which have resulted in aircraft in the ravine. The position of the ravine so close to the airport's overrun area has  raised some concerns among the general public, despite Toronto Pearson's compliance with all safety regulations. Spills. On March 24, 2020, approximately 400 litres of red ink spilled onto Etobicoke Creek, causing it to turn red.