About 100 people, as well as cargo, were reportedly on board the vessel when it sank on Lake Tanganyika.
Published On 25 Sep 202625 Sep 2026
At least 41 people have died, and 49 others have been rescued, after a boat capsized on Lake Tanganyika in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
Norris Mulongoyi, the provincial transport minister for DRC’s Tanganyika province, told The Associated Press news agency that search operations were under way to locate the remaining passengers.
Recommended Stories
list of 3 itemsend of list
The boat was reportedly carrying about 100 people and cargo when it capsized near the Congolese village of Mapera.
The vessel was travelling from the port of Kigoma in Tanzania to the city of Kalemie in DRC when it sank on Thursday.
A survivor identified as Annie Moyoni told Radio Okapi, a UN-backed Congolese broadcaster, that passengers were awakened at about 1am and found the boat tilting to one side.
It is unclear what caused the vessel to capsize, but hundreds of people have been killed in boat disasters in the DRC in recent years, according to the AP. Vessels are often overloaded and lack life jackets.
For many in the DRC, travelling by boat is the cheapest and most affordable way to get around. The country is one of the poorest in the world and lacks sufficient infrastructure for its more than 100 million people.
The sinking was the second loss of a Congolese vessel on the Kigoma-Kalemie route in less than a month.
On August 28, the Congolese vessel MV Pacifique caught fire and exploded at the port of Kigoma while loading fuel, according to Radio Okapi.
Six crew members were killed, and a seventh was reported missing, Radio Okapi said, citing port authorities. The vessel operated between Kigoma and Kalemie and was used to transport fuel.
At least 20 people also died when a wooden boat carrying students returning from state exams sank in central DRC in July.
WAUSAU, Wis. — U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany, the Republican nominee for Wisconsin governor, wiped away tears and laughed while sharing how thankful he was Sunday to survive a harrowing late-night emergency landing into a lake of the small plane he was riding in.
The pilot “said we are going down,” Tiffany told reporters at a downtown Wausau firehouse. “‘Pull your seat belt tight.’ I gave it a yank and pulled it good and tight. It was probably about 10 seconds later … we hit the water.”
Tiffany said he and the pilot, Leonard Boltz, remained on top of the plane in Lake Wausau until it began sinking. They decided on swimming to shore. He said they swam about 100 to 150 feet until they reached water shallow enough to stand in.
“We’re really fortunate that God was looking after us last night,” said Tiffany, 68.
The Marathon County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement that the emergency landing happened just before 9 p.m. Saturday. Boltz called 911 after the pair got out of the plane. They were rescued by emergency responders in a fire department airboat just after 9 p.m.
“The gravity of this is probably just hitting me at this point,” Tiffany said Sunday. “We were making jokes every step of the way last night. Though we knew it was a serious situation, we tried to keep it light through the whole thing.”
David Crowley, the Democratic gubernatorial nominee, wished Tiffany a “quick recovery” in a post on X and lauded the “heroism of the pilot.”
Tiffany said he was returning from the La Crosse County Lincoln Day Dinner when the single-engine, four-seat Beechcraft Bonanza aircraft lost power as it approached Wausau Downtown Airport.
Tiffany said he had a cut above his right eye that required 12 stitches. Boltz, who Tiffany said is a retired Air Force pilot, also suffered cuts and received four stitches.
Tiffany said the incident will not affect his gubernatorial campaign.
A no-wake buoy was placed near the plane, which remained in the lake, and boaters were asked to avoid the area until the aircraft can be removed, the sheriff’s office said.
A Federal Aviation Administration spokesperson said the agency would investigate the incident. A National Transportation Safety Board spokesperson said that agency is waiting for the FAA to assess the plane as to whether the damage was substantial enough for it to get involved.
For 10 days, the center of the cinematic universe is the Toronto International Film Festival, whose closest geographical landmark is currently a ludicrous controversy.
“Welcome to TIFF and welcome to the beautiful shore of — say it with me — Lake Ontario,” festival CEO Cameron Bailey said on opening night as he introduced “Being Heumann,” director Sian Heder’s crowd-pleasing follow-up to her best picture Oscar-winner “CODA.”
The crowd said it back. Google Maps, however, insists that the festival is actually a 15-minute stroll to Lake America. I’ve yet to hear a single person call it that without an eyeroll.
What’s in a name? Last year in the spirit of patriotism, my favorite Toronto coffee shop taped over the menu listing for its Americano to re-dub it a Canadiano. This fall, the sign has returned to Americano. Taking a pause from politics, I ordered a flat white.
Yet, the festival’s programmers seem to be decentralizing their attention-hogging neighbors to the south. Typically, TIFF is a launch pad for awards contenders. But there are fewer high profile Hollywood filmmakers this year than usual — which was also the case in Cannes. Perhaps these international festivals are testing their own waters to see if they’re obliged to invite Americans to their party.
Instead, the Toronto line-up boasts pointed films about fascism. On its surface, Michaël R. Roskam’s “Le Faux Soir” is a procedural account of how a network of rebels in occupied Belgium published its own parody issue of a pro-Nazi newspaper on the 25th anniversary of Armistice Day in 1943. Most of the script’s energy goes to talking about typesetting and rotary press flongs, but right before the end credits roll, “Le Faux Soir” blurts out its timeliness about combating Le Fox News with comedy. Metaphorically alluding to the satirical newspaper “The Onion,” the narrator says that to pull off this operation, the team had to stick together like layers of an onion: “Never forget, onion is strength.”
Plenty of local comedies abound, including “The Stunt Driver” by Michael Dowse (“Goon”), an energetic biopic about Ken “The Mad Canadian” Carter, the ’70s speedster who vowed to vault across the mile-wide river between Ottawa and New York in a rocket-powered Lincoln Continental. The site of Carter’s jump is four hours away from the fest, although at his car’s top speed of 280 mph, you could get there in less than one. Safer just to enjoy Jay Baruchel’s funny and endearing portrait of a reckless risk-taker who hates being called a daredevil as much as he resents Ben Foster’s Evel Knievel attempting to give him some advice. “Canadians are God’s chosen people,” Carter growls defiantly. “The last thing we need is a Yankee doodle dandy telling us how to do our jobs.”
It’s also possible that this year’s lack of big films — unlike 2025’s “Frankenstein,”“The Smashing Machine” and “Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery” — is just a reflection of the industry’s changing tides. Two of the buzziest guests at this year’s fest have been Inde Navarrette of the micro-budget horror hit “Obsession,” which premiered at last year’s TIFF, and British Columbia-born Hudson Williams of the TV hockey romance “Heated Rivalry.” Twelve months ago, both actors were anonymous Gen Z-ers who could have easily popped into Tim Hortons for a maple-glazed donut without causing a stir. Now they’re stars.
Personally, I’m all for fresh talent. Audiences and critics alike are bored of film executives clinging to the same proven names and proven plots as tightly as worry beads. Yes, I’m hoping to see some Oscar contenders while I’m here and have my fingers crossed for a few movies I’ll be seeing shortly. But for the sake of filmgoing at large, I’d be more thrilled to spot another under-the-radar “Obsession.”
So far, I haven’t found one. However, I have seen ingenuity made for peanuts, like Jenna Cato Bass’ “Future Tense,” a South African sci-fi drama about a travel service that allows the wealthy to blip back to the 1600s to hot tub under the clear skies before the land was ruined by centuries of trash, trade and colonization. Mismatched new couple Tara and Lwando (Kristen Raath and Lawrence Maleka) — she’s white and sunny, he’s Black and snide — take a blistering vacation that their relationship might not survive.
The script gets screwy in the last act, but Bass proves she can pull off a bold time travel premise using only tastefully bland décor, gorgeous nature footage and a couple of menacing brutes with guns. As a bonus, Raath, her lead, has the spunk, charm and smile of Karen Allen, giving a breakout performance that’s such a delight that you could almost swear the “Raiders of the Lost Ark” ingenue had leapt back four decades to star in the film.
An image from “Voices,” a musical drama set in the 1960s.
(TIFF)
While we’re talking about pivotal moments in personal histories, nine years ago Deanté Gray was a rookie wide receiver for the Houston Texans. He tore his ACL in practice and, after muscling through that disappointment, is now a first-time feature director with “Voices,” a lean and loud musical-thriller about thwarted dreams. Set in one tatty motel room in 1967 Detroit, “Voices” is a vicious flick about rising two soul acts hellbent on getting on stage that night to impress Motown Records’ Barry Gordy.
Technically, only the Harmony Brothers, Bubbles and Melvin (Joe Maye and Jamal R. Averett), are booked to play the gig. But a fame-hungry bellboy, Jordan (Francis C. Edemobi), and his cousin Derrick (Ezekiel Ajeigbe) hatch an impulsive, half-baked plan to perform in their rivals’ place. Egged on by Derrick’s ambitious girlfriend Mia (Raél Ba), who’s angling to be the duo’s opening act, this bad idea crescendos with a half-dozen original songs — and a body count.
The sound design of “Voices” is raw and the rumored $50,000 budget so strapped that minor period piece inconsistencies like cheap plastic trash cans sneak into the frame. Who cares? Sam Buckner III and Charlie T. Savage’s smart and surprising screenplay is crowded with scenes that let its cast shine. Someone — ideally, several people — in here will wind up getting their own major break.
Admittedly, I’m biased. Morbid musicals are one of my favorite micro-genres, from “Little Shop of Horrors” and “All That Jazz” to “A Star Is Born” and “Cabaret.” (If you haven’t seen Steve Martin’s 1981 Depression-era hoofer “Pennies From Heaven,” do that this week.)
Add Theo Rhys’ “Stuffed” to that list. Jodie Comer (“Killing Eve”) plays a goth taxidermist; Harry Melling (“Pillion”) is a lonely man terrified of dying, buried and forgotten. Can she convince the sad sack to kill himself now to become a piece of her permanent collection?
The plot alone gives you the shivers, nodding to predatory internet meet-ups and that volatile mix of victimization and egomania that causes people to hurt themselves and/or others. Dark as the story is, though, co-writer Joss Holden-Rea’s tunes are stunners with limber melodies and creatively off-kilter lyrics. “My past is still before me,” Melling belts, picturing himself proudly mounted in a velvet suit and bronze plaque.
“Stuffed” isn’t for everyone. But my fellow sickos are going to love this bleak and lovely tragicomedy once it sets sail from these shores (whatever they’re called by then) to a theater near you.
I wasn’t sure what to expect from an autumn trip to Finland, my first ever to the country, but spending an afternoon sprawled on a deck chair beneath blazing blue skies certainly wasn’t part of it. After a morning walking beneath the leafy canopy at the Mustila Arboretum – the oldest, most extensive botanical garden in the country – and a lunchtime wine-tasting (more of which later), my friend Sara and I pitched up at the Sahanlahti resort, deep in the Finnish Lakeland, only to find sun-drenched scenery that felt far more Mediterranean than Nordic.
Sahanlahti was the second stop on a mid-September road trip from Helsinki to the shores of Lake Saimaa; a journey in search of ruska, the spectacular autumn colours that blaze for a few short weeks before the long Finnish winter sets in. However, on our opening drive east from the airport to the Radalla resort, set on Lake Urajärvi, most of the thousands of trees we drove past were resolutely green, with just the very tips of the leaves tinged with auburn, like a foliage balayage.
Enjoying the peace at Sahanlahti resort on Lake Saimaa. Photograph: Annabelle Thorpe
“You’re too early,” the waitress told us, cheerfully, after we had checked in to our chic waterfront cabins, and were tucking into hefty plates of crispy garlic chicken, scattered with freshly picked chanterelles, in Radalla’s quiet dining room. “But you might get some sun tomorrow.” Later, walking back to our cabins through thick drizzle, we agreed she was most probably just being kind.
The Radalla resort is just one of dozens of lakeside hotels scattered across southern Finland – many with self-catering cabins, sauna complexes and gleaming metal steps that lead from wooden piers down into the chilly waters of the lake. The grey drizzle we awoke to made a dip less than appealing, and instead we decided to set off for our next stop, taking in the arboretum en route before finding a place for lunch.
Driving in southern Finland turned out to be quite different from other countries. Most settlements fringe the lakesides, so they tend to be tucked away down side roads leading off from the main highway. Instead, trees – those resolutely green trees – rolled past us for mile after mile, until slowly the fields began to melt into lakes, one after another, the road snaking alongside the blue-grey waters, or stitching together small islets that lay scattered between them.
Googling somewhere for lunch, Sara came across the Ollinmäki winery, an unexpected find in a country that grows absolutely no grapes. Instead, berry wines are hugely popular, and once settled in at our table, we were persuaded to try a flight of six, accompanied by a bowl of hearty elk soup (which tasted considerably better than it looked) and a leaf salad with local cheese. One wine, the white currant and berry Myllärin Matti was particularly delicious, with the tang of a crisp sauvignon – although I wouldn’t want to find out what a Finnish hangover feels like.
From the winery it was an easy drive to Sahanlahti, by which time the weather had cleared and pin-sharp blue skies gleamed above the shores of Lake Saimaa. The main house – painted butterscotch-yellow and dating back to the mid-18th century, when the owners presided over the local sawmill – had a languidly old-fashioned air, but dinner at the Koskivahti restaurant was anything but: rich mushroom soup, slivers of goose confit with lingonberry sauce, wafer-thin beetroot carpaccio with tangy goat’s cheese.
Annabelle Thorpe and friend foraging for wild mushrooms. Photograph: Annabelle Thorpe
It might have been too early for the leaves to turn, but we had arrived right in the middle of harvest season, when heading out into the fields and islands to pick wild mushrooms and berries (of which there are 35 different varieties) is practically a national sport. We had barely set down our bags at our final stop, Järvisydän resort, before we were whizzing out across Saimaa on a small motor boat, baskets tucked between our feet, to hunt for chanterelles and look for rare ringed seals and ospreys.
The sky was flawlessly blue as we whipped across the water, disembarking first to pick the mushrooms – slashes of bright yellow among the green undergrowth. We were guided in our harvesting by Sebastian, the 12th generation of the Heiskanen family to be running Järvisydän. “Back in 1654,” he told us, “my family were given a portion of land by the Russian tsar, to build a tavern on the route between St Petersburg and Helsinki.” More than 350 years later, the tavern has morphed into a 100-room resort, offering everything from starkly modern glass-walled cabins, high in the forest, to hexagonal log houses with bedrooms set off a central, fire-lit atrium, and camping pods.
It’s an extraordinary place: everything – from the vast reception, dwarfed by a replica Viking longship hull hung above reception, to the restaurants, bar and the Hobbit-like spa – is built entirely from local stone and timber. A visit to the spa seemed the perfect way to warm up after our chilly boat trip, with six different saunas to dip into – although the “sunken log” sauna, where the temperature reached 70C, gave me some sense of how an ice-cream might feel if left out in the sun.
Of the three resorts we visited, Järvisydän was the standout – for its history, for the spectacular scenery of Lake Saimaa that surrounds it, for the delicious mushroom soup and for the long, sunlit walk we took on our final afternoon, through the dense pine forest, where red squirrels skittered around in the branches above. It was a wrench to leave on our last morning, but as we sped back along quiet roads to Helsinki, we agreed Finland had – in spite of our foliage fail – outstripped our expectations. It was more beautiful, more peaceful, more sunkissed than we could ever have imagined.
Ruska (the vibrant colours of autumn foliage) begins in the north of the country in early to mid-September, reaching the Lake Saimaa region in the south by early October.
The trip was provided by Discover the World. A four-night bespoke self-drive trip staying at Radalla, Sahanlahti and Järvisydän resorts starts at £794pp, including B&B and car hire, but not flights.
REBEKAH Vardy is to swap the dolce vita of Italy for Burnley FC after hubby Jamie joined the Clarets yesterday.
The Wag, 44, will have to pack up her glam dresses to make the move from their £2million villa in Salò, Lake Garda, where former England striker Jamie played for Cremonese last season.
Rebekah Vardy is swapping the dolce vita of Italy for Burnley FCCredit: InstagramThe Vardys will be leaving their £2million villa in Salò, Lake Garda, picturedCredit: Alamy
It means he is likely to relocate to the Lancashire town — 137 miles north of the family home in Grantham, Lincs.
Sign up for the Showbiz newsletter
Thank you!
It is hoped he will revive the Clarets after a bad start to the season.
Jamie, 39, said: “This club has a proper footballing history and passionate fans who deserve a team that represents them and their town. I can’t wait to get going on the pitch and help the team move in the right direction.”
Jamie has signed for Burnley FCCredit: AlamyBecky is a regular at his games and previously spoke about getting more nervous than hubby Jamie does during matchesCredit: Instagram
Rather than move full-time to Burnley, it is expected Becky will remain at their Grantham home near to where their children, Sofia and Ella, go to school.
She faces a two-and-a-half-hour drive to Turf Moor to see Jamie in action.
Becky is a regular at his games and previously spoke about getting more nervous than he does during matches.
She said: “Jamie is so laid back about football, he doesn’t get nervous.
Vardy on pitch for CremoneseCredit: Getty
“The only time I get nervous is when he has to take a penalty.
“It’s anxiety-inducing and I’m always so relieved when he hits the back of the net.”
Becky faced a public backlash after losing her 2022 “Wagatha Christie” High Court libel case with Coleen Rooney, over leaked Instagram stories.
Ontario premier Doug Ford has unveiled a massive billboard-size ‘Lake Ontario’ sign in response to Trump ordering US federal agencies to refer to it as ‘Lake America’ amid a trade war between Canada and the US. Ford said Trump can ‘call it whatever he wants’ but that the world will keep using its original name.
Aug. 29 (UPI) — Ontario Premier Doug Ford on Saturday erected a massive sign saying “Lake Ontario — Now and Always” in a rebuke to President Donald Trump‘s move to rename the body of water Lake America.
The sign in Hamilton sits on the shores of Lake Ontario and measures 18 feet tall, nearly two stories. It also says in French, “Lac Ontario — Aujourd’hui et pour toujours.”
“I’m here on the shores of beautiful Lake Ontario, a crown jewel of our province and our country,” Ford said in a video statement posted on X. “You may have heard that President Trump is trying to rename this lake, all because he doesn’t like Ontario and Canada standing up for ourselves.”
“But let’s be serious,” he added. “Long before President Trump, this lake was called Lake Ontario, and long after President Trump is gone, it will still be called Lake Ontario.”
He called Canada “entitled” and repeated claims that the country has ripped off the United States for years.
Canadian Prime Minister said it would be called Lake Ontario “now and always.”
J. Conrad Sence, president of Seneca Nation, said, “The president cannot assert ownership over our culture or erase it through irresponsible political action.”
“His order should be rescinded and the name Lake Ontario should be left as it is, reflective of the Seneca people, other Haudenosaunee nations and all Indigenous people surrounding the lake,” Seneca said in a statement shared with WIVB.
“To us, Lake Ontario is not a political pawn,” he added. “It does not separate the countries of the United States and Canada. It is all Indigenous land, which has been occupied by Indigenous people since time immemorial.”
Aug. 28 (UPI) — The leader of the Seneca Nation on Friday called on President Donald Trump to reverse his decision to rename Lake Ontario as Lake America.
Trump on Thursday signed an executive order renaming the body of water amid a trade dispute with Canada.
J. Conrad Sence, president of Seneca Nation, said, “The president cannot assert ownership over our culture or erase it through irresponsible political action.”
“His order should be rescinded and the name Lake Ontario should be left as it is, reflective of the Seneca people, other Haudenosaunee nations and all Indigenous people surrounding the lake,” Seneca said in a statement shared with WIVB.
“To us, Lake Ontario is not a political pawn,” he added. “It does not separate the countries of the United States and Canada. It is all Indigenous land, which has been occupied by Indigenous people since time immemorial.”
Jérôme Marty, executive director at the International Association for Great Lakes Research, said the lake was named by indigenous people.
“They gave the name of Lake Ontario, and then this name was then used to give the name of the province of Ontario, so it’s certainly not the province of Ontario that gave the name of the Lake Ontario, but it’s the opposite,” Marty told WIVB. “It’s prior to Canada, the creation of the United States, it’s been there for a really, really long time.”
Conrad told WGRZ the people of the region will continue to call it Lake Ontario, and urged others to do the same.
In a statement, a White House spokesperson pushed back against the criticism.
“As the president said yesterday, the majority of the great lake’s volume sits in United States territory,” the spokesperson told WIVB. “Thanks to President Trump’s bold action, its name will now reflect its place in America and her heritage.”
Lake Ontario is called sga:nyodai:yoh in the Seneca language, meaning “beautiful lake,” WGRZ reported.
Trump has also changed the name of Alaska’s Mount Denali, an indigenous name, to Mount McKinley after the 25th president of the United States.
He also renamed the Gulf of Mexico to Gulf of America.
Nepal and China have paused rescue efforts for survivors of the devastating flash flood that hit the border region two days ago as a “barrier lake” formed during the disaster began to overflow.
Chinese rescue teams and vehicles were forced to pull back to safe ground, state broadcaster CCTV reported, as the risk of the lake bursting rose. Nepalese authorities also paused search operations for 90 minutes, an army officer confirmed.
The “barrier lake”, formed as Wednesday’s flash flood carried huge volumes of mud and debris down a steep valley, is threatening to unleash another huge and destructive wave.
In Nepal’s Rasuwa district, on the border with Tibet, residents were seen scrambling up hillsides to escape potential surges in the river level, according to the Reuters news agency.
The barrier lake adds a new threat to communities devastated by Wednesday’s flash flood [EPA]
The disaster unfolded as a glacier collapsed and sent a huge torrent of ice, water, rock, and mud down Himalayan river valleys, burying entire villages and destroying roads, bridges, and hydropower plants.
In its wake, leftover debris trapped water to form a barrier lake, a natural dam created when landslides block a river.
With water continuing to pour into the lake, the threat to downstream communities of another wave of flooding is rising.
China has deployed an engineering team to conduct aerial surveys and 3D modelling of the site. By Friday, the lake’s volume had swelled to more than 2.5 million cubic metres, up from the estimated 1.5 to 2 million cubic metres recorded just a day earlier.
Downstream in Nepal, officials received warnings that the lake had begun breaking its bank, according to Narendra Pariyar, the top administrator in the hard-hit Rasuwa district.
“We can see that the level of water in the river is rising,” he said, adding that the exact height of the surge remains unclear.
Relief supplies blocked
The death toll from the disaster has surpassed 470. On Friday, the Nepalese prime minister’s office reported 469 confirmed deaths, with 977 people still missing. About 1,550 people have been rescued.
Chinese authorities reported on Friday that the death toll in Tibet has now risen to at least five, with 558 missing.
Bishal Nath Upreti, president of the Nepal Centre for Disaster Management, told Al Jazeera that conditions are “extremely difficult” for those trapped in the disaster zone, as destroyed roads have left them completely cut off.
So far, about 800 people have been rescued by helicopter and 700 by land, with airlifts delivering vital aid to survivors.
Al Jazeera’s Katrina Yu, reporting from Beijing, said the number of missing is expected to rise. China has deployed about 500 military and paramilitary personnel and sent Premier Li Qiang to supervise operations on the ground, while Nepal has deployed 30,000 security personnel to search remote, cut-off valleys, she said.
More than 90,000 people are estimated to have been affected by disaster, the Red Cross said on Friday, adding that the delivery of relief supplies has been blocked by the overflowing lake.
“We’re of course very concerned about the secondary flood,” said David Fisher, head of delegation for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies in Nepal.
WASHINGTON — President Trump said Thursday he is renaming Lake Ontario to be known as “Lake America” in the United States as he exacerbates his trade war with Canada.
The Republican president signed an executive order directing the Interior Department to update the lake’s name in the U.S. geographic naming service. Trump cannot force Canada to follow his preferred naming convention, however.
Trump has been floating the idea of the name change in recent days as the U.S. announced it was imposing 50% tariffs on $20 billion worth of Canadian goods over the weekend after talks between the countries broke down. Trump has been needling America’s northern neighbor since he returned to the White House last year, suggesting the ally with whom the U.S. once had warm relations instead should be absorbed as the 51st state.
Canada responded to Trump’s import taxes this week by imposing retaliatory tariffs on $20 billion worth of American goods, including steel, dairy products, appliances and farm equipment.
Trump, who signed the order as he was sitting at the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office, had a large sign behind him propped on a stand with a map of the Great Lakes. Over Lake Ontario, in big red letters, the map read “Lake America.”
On the other side of the president was another map with the words, “MAKING THE GREAT LAKES EVEN GREATER.”
The lake is one of multiple Great Lakes that the U.S. and Canada share borders along.
The office of Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
There is no single international body that determines names of international bodies of water, and Trump has wide latitude over how the U.S. government recognizes geographic places and landmarks.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford, who has traded insults with Trump, this week brushed aside the prospect of Trump changing the lake’s name as “a lot of rhetoric.”
The name Lake Ontario comes from the Huron Indigenous people’s word “oniatarí:io,” that means “lake of shining waters.” The province of Ontario, founded in 1867, took its name from the lake.
Trump said that while his action was not meant to send any particular geopolitical message, “Canada’s been ripping us off for a long time” on trade and military issues.
“They wanted to be treated like a state and they’re not a state,” the president said. “We just can’t do that anymore.”
“We love the people of Canada,” Trump added. “I don’t think their representatives do an appropriate job. Maybe they’ll change. I really don’t know. It doesn’t make much difference.”
The move is reminiscent of his move last year to rename the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America.”
Trump scribbled his name with a Sharpie pen on the executive order, then held it up for the cameras, offering, “And we filed all the necessary papers, documents, everything else.”
“We’ve notified all of the various people that we have to notify. So, we’ve done everything that you have to do,” he said. “And this is official, effective immediately.”
The executive order Trump signed shows that the changes, in fact, are supposed to be made within 30 days.
He also suggested his push to rename bodies of water may not be finished.
“So, if you think about it, we have a gulf and we have a lake. Now, all we need is an ocean,” Trump said. “So maybe we’ll have to change the name of the Atlantic and or the Pacific. Maybe we’ll change them.”
Price and Weissert write for the Associated Press. AP writer Rob Gillies in Toronto contributed to this report.
1 of 3 | A poster shows the name change from Lake Ontario to Lake America, as President Donald Trump signs an executive order on the renaming, amid a recent trade war with Canada, in the Oval Office of the White House on Thursday. Photo by Al Drago/UPI | License Photo
Aug. 27 (UPI) — President Donald Trump signed an executive order Thursday to rename Lake Ontario as “Lake America” after his dispute with Canada over tariffs last week.
Trump threatened to rename the lake Tuesday on Truth Social, saying, “The United States is giving serious consideration to changing the name of Lake Ontario to Lake America in that we don’t expect to be doing much business with Ontario any longer.”
“We’re going to be changing the name of Lake Ontario, effective immediately, to Lake America,” the president said just before signing the order.
“No message,” he said. “As you know, Canada has been ripping us off for a long time on trade, very, very sadly. Even the military. You know, we defend Canada for nothing.”
Canada is a founding member of NATO.
The order says that within 30 days, Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum will update the Geographic Names Information System. The GNIS works with the U.S. Board on Geographic Names to standardize geographic names for federal use.
Trump renamed the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America and Mount Denali to Mount McKinley on his first day in office in 2025. He can’t force other countries or private entities to use the new names, but he can force the federal government to.
Because it’s an international boundary water, Canada and the U.S. jointly manage Lake Ontario through the International Joint Commission under the Boundary Waters Treaty of 1909.