NIAGARA DISTRICT - The residents of Niagara area woke to an unusual sight no human eye has seen since the last glacial: the dry riverbed of Niagara Falls. In what appears to be yet another publicity stunt by Greenpeace, the organisation managed to shut off the water flow through the Amercian Falls.

The news started to spread in the wee hours of the morning, when early birds heading for work and night owls heading home stopped in their tracks in utter disbelieve as they stared at the dry riverbed of the American Falls.

Sgt. Grumball, head officer at the local police station recalls: "It was around 4:50 am, when the first report came in. To tell the truth: I suspected a prank at first, we do get a fair share of those. I sent a patrol car to look after matters. Their report went like: "I'll be damned, it's a dam!" Then matters exploded. Our phone system collapsed under the load of incoming calls. That's when I decided to call in the National Guard."

The news spread like wildfire. Husbands called their wifes, wifes called the hubbies telling them of the most spectacular occurance imaginable short of an actual UFO landing here. It was at around 5:20, when I finally got word from a friend: "You gotta see this. Move ya ass." Boy, was he right.

I arrived at the scene not one minute too late. Traffic already clogged with the sudden rush of resident onlookers. Soon it would came to a standstill. As news spread further the Wide Niagara area traffic completely collapsed. Journalists and news broadcaster pouring in from Buffalo met with police cars and the National Guard franticly trying to get to the scene. All of them are now stuck in a growing ring of about 30 miles diameter.

I've been talking to tourists, employees, employers and residents. The incident has caused most diverse reactions.

This is Mr. Lawndry's take, he is manager at the Embassy Suits.

Q: Mr. Lawndry, could you summarize how the guests of your establishment feel about this incident?
A: Many of our guests expressed disappointment. They were looking forward to a once-in-your-lifetime experience - and now this. In fact, disappointment is too polite a word to describe the emotions of the majority of our guests.
Q: Tell me more.
A: If you insist, I'll quote: I'm going to sue those fuckers, they ruined my vacation."
Q: You must get at lot of heat.
A: Indeed we do. Quite irrationally, many of our guests demand a refund from us.

I spoke to Mr. Laughton, syndic of the local tourist guild about the legal situation. He said: "This will prove to be an interesting case. The tourist industry has excluded Acts of God in their terms of services since long. Of course this is just a figural way of speaking. Yet many customers literally argue, that this was not an Act of God. They want their money back."

Not everybody is as sceptical as Mr. Lawndry. One man begs to differ. Jack O. Trade, notorious maverick entrepreneur, has a different take on the issue: "Mr. Lawndry has it all backwards. He just doesn't see the potential. Let's have a Drybed-Memorial-Week once every year, heck, make that a Drybed-Memorial-Month. People will love it, they'll visit the Falls not once, but twice in their lifetime."

Mr. Trade has a point. People were eager to explore the dry riverbed, bringing back an improbable array of things from the exposed bottom of the river. Guns were found, dating back to the days of the Mobsters. I've seen one guy presenting a few very authentic looking tomahawks.

Police has now put an end to this for safety reasons after a series of booms rocked the air and almost caused panic. It wasn't the dam, though, that was about to crack and crumble. The owner of the sightseeing boat "Maid of the Mist" always had to avoid dangerous rocks. Now that the river was not running and the rocks were in plain sight, the boat’s owner went out to blast the rocks away with explosives.