| Pagwa | |
| Settlement | |
| Name origin: Named for the Pagwachuan River | |
| Country | Canada |
|---|---|
| Province | Ontario |
| Region | Northeastern Ontario |
| District | Cochrane |
| Part | Cochrane, Unorganized, North |
| Elevation | 188 m (617 ft) |
| Coordinates | |
| Founded | 1913 |
| Timezone | Eastern Time Zone (UTC-5) |
| - summer (DST) | Eastern Time Zone (UTC-4) |
| Postal code FSA | P0L |
| Area code | 705, 249 |
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Location of Pagwa in Ontario
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Pagwa is an unincorporated place and railway point in geographic Bicknell Township[1][2] in Unorganized North Cochrane District in northeastern Ontario, Canada.[3] It is named for the Pagwachuan River.
Pagwa is on a now abandoned portion of the Canadian National Railway main line originally constructed as the National Transcontinental Railway transcontinental main line,[4] between the railway points of Wilgar to the west and Pagwa River to the east, 3 kilometres (1.9 mi) west of the point where the line crossed the Pagwachuan River at the community of Pagwa River.
A now abandoned airfield, created by the Department of National Defence[5] in the mid-1930s in part using 47,047 person-days of unemployment relief labour,[6] lies on the north of rail line. A Frontier College instructor was located at the construction camp.[5] The airfield became in the late 1930s part of a string of emergency landing sites for Trans-Canada Air Lines (today Air Canada) to support their transcontinental flight operations.[7] From 1952 to 1966, the airfield was USAF Pagwa Air Station and then RCAF Station Pagwa, and operated as part of the Pinetree Line and other subsequent continental defence systems.
Pagwa is also on Airfield Creek, part of the James Bay drainage basin, which flows via the Pagwachuan River, Kenogami River and Albany River to James Bay.