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Fort McMurray is located at 56°40'N and 111°40'W, 370 m above sea level. It is 435 km northeast of Edmonton on Highway 63, almost 100 km west of the Saskatchewan border, nestled in the boreal forest at the confluence of the Athabasca River and the Clearwater River .
The population of Wood Buffalo ( 2001 census) is 41,466, with the majority of that located within the immediate area of Fort McMurray, which used to have city status but which incorporated into Wood Buffalo a few years ago.
The average temperature at Fort McMurray is -19.8°C in January and +16.6°C in July. Its annual rainfall amounts to 334.5 mm, its snowfall is 172.0 cm. The total amount of sunshine over the year is 2,108 hours.
Fort McMurray is considered the heart of one of Alberta's (and Canada's) major hubs of oil production , located near the Athabasca Tar Sands. Besides the tar sands, its industries rely on natural gas and pipeline sectors, forestry and tourism.
Fort Chipewyan is Alberta's oldest settled community. Over 200 years ago, Peter Pond and the voyageurs of the Northwest Trading Company traveled this area in search of furs.
In addition to Fort McMurray, The Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo consists of ten smaller communities: Anzac, DraperDraper is the now largely obsolete term for a merchant in cloth or dry goods. The drapers were an important trade guild. A number of people of prominent people were at one time or another drapers: Margaret Bondfield John Lewis Anthony Munday H. Wells Geor, Fort ChipewyanFort Chipewyan is the oldest European settlement in the province of Alberta, Canada. The settlement was established by the North West Company when it setup a trading post there in 1788. The Fort was named after the Chipewyan First Nation living in the are, Fort Fitzgerald , Fort MacKay , Gregoire Lake Estates , Janvier , Mariana Lakes and Saprae Creek Estates .
Alberta communities