‘Where’s the rock?’: Photographer captures dramatic before-and-after shots of N.W.T. waterfall | CBC News

It was the perfect setting for some spectacular and dramatic wedding photos — a wide, rocky ledge, overlooking a stunning northern waterfall. 

And standing proudly at the bottom of the N.W.T.’s Carcajou Falls, seemingly immovable amid the churning river, a massive, craggy pillar of rock, the very symbol of solidity and stability.

That was then. Now, the pillar is gone, apparently reduced by the river to rubble in a matter of days.

“It’s kind of sad to see that it’s gone,” said photographer Nicky Lynn Richards, who lives in Norman Wells, N.W.T., one of the communities nearest to the remote falls. She’s taken plenty of photographs there — including some amazing wedding photos. 

“You know, you see waterfalls all the time, but I’ve never seen anything like that before, that had this rock formation that just looked so cool. So I loved that about it.”

It’s not clear exactly when the pillar fell — few people get out to see it — but according to Richards, it was about a year ago. 

She had flown by helicopter over the remote falls in June 2022 and the pillar was there in all its glory. But about a month later, in July 2022, a friend of hers was there and it was gone. Her friend had photos to prove it. 

“It was unbelievable. I thought she was actually in the wrong place because I thought, ‘this is not Carcajou Falls, where’s the rock?'” Richards recalled. 

“I was chomping at the bit to get out there and see this for myself.”

The falls are not easy to get to without a helicopter, so Richards didn’t make it until a few weeks ago. She was immediately struck by the changed landscape. It did feel like a different place.

“I’m assuming that it must have fallen, maybe just crumbled … we didn’t see any sign of it at all,” she said.

“It must have just been, you know, corroding away and corroding away from that water. And like I said, it’s something that I figured would happen one day, but for it to be in our lifetime is just crazy.”

‘Happens all the time,’ says geologist

Viktor Terlaky, a geologist with the Northwest Territories Geological Survey, agreed that it was bound to happen sooner or later, but the exact timing couldn’t have been predicted.

“It’s just part of a natural process that happens all the time,” he said. 

Terlaky said the pillar was made up of many interbedded layers of harder sandstones and softer shales. The shales erode more in the moving water, and so eventually the whole formation became unstable and toppled.

“Just by looking at the photo, there’s quite a bit of water coming through that river, right? So any smaller pieces would just be washed away immediately,” he said.

“It’s super neat to be able to witness, even shortly after the fact.”

Still, Richards admits she’s a bit disappointed, because the falls — featured in N.W.T. tourism promotions and even on a Canada Post stamp in 2020 — are now just a little less epic. 

“Now it just looks like a waterfall,” she said. 

“Again — waterfalls are beautiful. I love it. I’ll be going out there and I’ll be taking pictures anytime I have the chance to do it. But that rock missing is different for sure, and Mother Nature has taken its course, I guess.”