Special Marine Warning Issued for Niagara River and Buffalo Harbor
This alert is no longer in effect.
NOAA issued it on July 17, 2026, 5 weeks ago. Warnings of this kind stay in effect for hours to a few days, so this page is a historical record of what was issued, not a current warning. For conditions where you are right now, check weather.gov (US), weather.gc.ca (Canada), the Met Office (UK), or the Bureau of Meteorology (Australia).
Areazine synthesizes this NWS weather alert directly from NOAA's official public data feed. See our methodology for full source attribution and refresh cadence.
NWS Buffalo has issued a Special Marine Warning for Lake Erie, Lake Ontario, and the Niagara River areas until 1:00 AM EDT.
Read this weather record in 30 seconds
- Record type
- Special Marine Warning
- Affected area
- Western New York Great Lakes
- Issued
- July 17, 2026
- Issuing authority
- NWS Buffalo NY
Marine notices apply to named waters or shoreline zones. They may not describe conditions on land, even when the nearest place name is the same.
Record status: historical. It was issued 5 weeks ago; use the issuing agency's live warning service for current conditions in Western New York Great Lakes.
Alert Details
A Special Marine Warning (MA.W) has been issued by the National Weather Service Buffalo NY. The alert is effective from June 16 at 11:36 PM EDT until June 17 at 1:00 AM EDT.
Affected Areas
The warning covers Upper Niagara River and Buffalo Harbor; Dunkirk to Buffalo NY; Lower Niagara River; Niagara River to Hamlin Beach NY; and areas beyond 5NM off shoreline to US-Canadian border. Locations impacted include Small Boat Harbor, Thirty Mile Point, Grand Island, Olcott, Woodlawn Beach, Erie Basin Marina, Wilson, Fort Niagara, Sturgeon Point, Youngstown, Wanakah, Lewiston, Sunset Beach, Athol Springs, and Bayview.
What You Should Do
Move to safe harbor immediately as gusty winds and high waves are expected. Small craft could be damaged in briefly higher winds and suddenly higher waves.
Expected Conditions
At 11:34 PM EDT, a line of showers and a couple thunderstorms were located along a line extending from 20 nm northwest of Fort Niagara to 20 nm west of Niagara River to near Wanakah to 17 nm southeast of Sunset Bay, moving northeast at 35 knots. Hazard includes wind gusts 34 knots or greater.
Timeline
The alert is in effect from June 16, 2026 at 11:36 PM EDT and expires June 17, 2026 at 1:00 AM EDT.
Original source: NOAA Official Notice ↗
Related Weather Alerts
All Weather Alerts →Nationwide notices with similar length or severity timing 8
Two Areazine-derived peer sets for this NWS weather alert: nearest notices by body length and by same severity near the same agency date. Peers come from other categories so they are not the same-feed Related list above.
Similar body length
Nearest notices by article body length (1,247 characters here).
Similar severity timing
Same severity (high) notices issued closest in time to July 17, 2026.
Frequently Asked Questions
Common questions about this NWS weather alert.