The
Fraser River is the longest river within
British Columbia,
Canada, rising at
Fraser Pass near
Mount Robson in the
Rocky Mountains and flowing for , into the
Strait of Georgia at the city of
Vancouver. It is the 10th longest river in Canada. The river's annual discharge at its mouth is or , and it discharges 20 million tons of sediment into the ocean. The river is named for
Simon Fraser, who led an expedition on behalf of the
North West Company from the site of present-day
Prince George almost to the mouth of the river. The river's name in the
Halqemeylem (Upriver Halkomelem) language is
Sto:lo, often seen archaically as
Staulo, and has been adopted by the Halkomelem-speaking peoples of the Lower Mainland as their collective name, . The river's name in the
Dakelh language is
Lhtakoh. The
Tsilhqot'in name for the river, not dissimilar to the
Dakelh name, is
ʔElhdaqox, meaning
Sturgeon (ʔElhda) River
(Qox).