Lake Michigan-Huron
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Lake Michigan-Huron is a designation given to the body of water (part of the North American Great Lakes) traditionally considered to be two separate lakes: Lake Michigan and Lake Huron. Hydrologically, however, they are a single body of water, connected by the Straits of Mackinac, which are 5 miles (8.0 km) wide and 120 feet (37 m) deep.[1] They lie at the same surface elevation, 577 feet (176 m), rise and fall together, and the flow between them sometimes reverses from eastward to westward.[2] However, this connection is geographically small in comparison to the body of water, and the two sections have long been referred to as distinct lakes.
If designated as a single entity, 45,410-square-mile (117,600 km2) Lake Michigan-Huron is the largest of the Great Lakes, and indeed the largest freshwater lake in the world, in terms of surface area. (It is exceeded in surface area only by the Caspian Sea, which by tradition and due to its salinity is commonly not counted as a lake). Lake Superior still holds more water, containing 3,000 cubic miles (12,500 km3) of water compared with Michigan-Huron's 2,000 cubic miles (8,300 km3), which makes Lake Michigan-Huron the fourth largest freshwater lake by volume in the world (the first and second being Lake Baikal and Lake Tanganyika).
During the last ice age, the lake consisted of more than one body of water, with what is now Lake Huron (known to geologists as Lake Stanley) separate from what is now Lake Michigan (Lake Chippewa). Before that Lake Chicago occupied the southern tip of the Lake Michigan basin, at the southern extent of the glaciers.
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- ^ [1]
- ^ The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration states, "Lakes Michigan and Huron are considered to be one lake hydraulically because of their connection through the deep Straits of Mackinac."[2], and the United States Army Corps of Engineers says "Lakes Michigan and Huron are considered to be one lake, as they rise and fall together due to their union at the Straits of Mackinac."[3]
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