Cabot Strait (; , ) is in

Atlantic Canada Atlantic Canada, also called the Atlantic provinces (), is the list of regions of Canada, region of Eastern Canada comprising four provinces: New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island. As of 2021, the landma ...

between Cape Ray,

Newfoundland Newfoundland and Labrador is the easternmost province of Canada, in the country's Atlantic region. The province comprises the island of Newfoundland and the continental region of Labrador, having a total size of . As of 2025 the population ...

, and Cape North,

Cape Breton Island Cape Breton Island (, formerly '; or '; ) is a rugged and irregularly shaped island on the Atlantic coast of North America and part of the province of Nova Scotia, Canada. The island accounts for 18.7% of Nova Scotia's total area. Although ...

. The strait, approximately 110 kilometres wide, is the widest of the three outlets for the

Gulf of Saint Lawrence The Gulf of St. Lawrence is a gulf that fringes the shores of the provinces of Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland and Labrador, in Canada, plus the islands Saint-Pierre and Miquelon, possessions of France, in ...

into the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second largest of the world's five borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions, with an area of about . It covers approximately 17% of Earth#Surface, Earth's surface and about 24% of its water surface area. During the ...

, the others being the

Strait of Belle Isle The Strait of Belle Isle ( ; ) is a waterway in eastern Canada, that separates Labrador from the island of Newfoundland (island), Newfoundland, in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador. Location The strait is located in the southeast of the ...

and Strait of Canso. It is named for the Italian explorer Giovanni Caboto.

Geography and geology

Bathymetry

The strait's bathymetry is varied, with the Laurentian Channel creating a deep trench through its centre, and comparatively shallow coastal waters closer to Newfoundland and Cape Breton Island. These bathymetric conditions have been known by mariners to cause

rogue wave A rogue wave is an abnormally large ocean wave. Rogue wave may also refer to: * Optical rogue waves, are rare pulses of light analogous to rogue or freak ocean waves. * Rogue Wave Software, a software company * Rogue Wave (band), an American in ...

s. The steep slope of the Laurentian Channel was the site of a disastrous submarine landslide at the southeastern end of the strait, triggered by the 1929 Grand Banks earthquake and leading to a

tsunami A tsunami ( ; from , ) is a series of waves in a water body caused by the displacement of a large volume of water, generally in an ocean or a large lake. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and underwater explosions (including detonations, ...

that devastated communities along Newfoundland's south coast and parts of Cape Breton Island.

St. Paul Island

An infamous location in the strait for

shipwreck A shipwreck is the wreckage of a ship that is located either beached on land or sunken to the bottom of a body of water. It results from the event of ''shipwrecking'', which may be intentional or unintentional. There were approximately thre ...

s during the

age of sail The Age of Sail is a period in European history that lasted at the latest from the mid-16th (or mid-15th) to the mid-19th centuries, in which the dominance of sailing ships in global trade and warfare culminated, particularly marked by the int ...

, St. Paul Island came to be referred to as the "Graveyard of the Gulf" (of St. Lawrence).

Shipping

A strategically important waterway throughout Canadian and Newfoundland history, the strait is also an important international shipping route, being the primary waterway linking the Atlantic with inland ports on the

Great Lakes The Great Lakes, also called the Great Lakes of North America, are a series of large interconnected freshwater lakes spanning the Canada–United States border. The five lakes are Lake Superior, Superior, Lake Michigan, Michigan, Lake Huron, H ...

and St. Lawrence Seaway. In October 1942, German U-boat ''U-69'' torpedoed and sank the unlit Newfoundland ferry , killing 137 people. Then on 25 November 1944 HMCS ''Shawinigan'' was torpedoed and sunk with all hands on board (91 crew) by . In 1998, the Cypriot bulk carrier the split in half in the Cabot Strait while sailing from Rotterdam to Quebec with the loss of 21 lives on board.

Communications

The strait is crossed daily by the Marine Atlantic ferry service linking Channel-Port aux Basques and North Sydney.

Ferries A ferry is a boat or ship that transports passengers, and occasionally vehicles and cargo, across a body of water. A small passenger ferry with multiple stops, like those in Venice, Italy, is sometimes referred to as a water taxi or water bus. ...

have been operating across the strait since 1898, and a submarine telegraph cable was laid in 1856 as part of the transatlantic telegraph cable project. The Trans Canada Microwave system was extended to

in 1959. To get it to Newfoundland, it was fed from

Sydney, Nova Scotia Sydney is a former city and urban community on the east coast of Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia, Canada within the Cape Breton Regional Municipality. Sydney was founded in 1785 by the British, was incorporated as a city in 1904, and dissolv ...

to a repeater in Cape North that was 427 metres above sea-level. That allowed it cross the 127 kilometres across the Cabot Strait to a repeater station perched 198 metres above sea-level in Red Rocks, Newfoundland and Labrador. From there, the signal was microwaved over land to St. John's.

References

;Notes *

Nautical chart A nautical chart or hydrographic chart is a graphic representation of a sea region or water body and adjacent coasts or river bank, banks. Depending on the scale (map), scale of the chart, it may show depths of water (bathymetry) and heights of ...

br>''#4022 - Cabot Strait and approaches / Détroit de Cabot et les approches)''
published by Canadian Hydrographic Service, 17 January 2003 {{Authority control Straits of Newfoundland and Labrador Straits of Nova Scotia Straits of the Atlantic Ocean Borders of Newfoundland and Labrador Borders of Nova Scotia Canada–Saint Pierre and Miquelon border