Boiler Rapids, previously known as Joe's Rapids, apparently got its name when a boiler being taken for the Wrigley — a new steamboat in the process of being built for the Hudson's Bay Company — went down and was lost. This became the stopping place for the boiler, which was travelling by scow. This event occurred in mid-summer 1885, when Captain Smith, who had built the Grahame, was taking the boiler and two other scow loads for the Wrigley down the Athabasca. The boiler was eventually retrieved. The name Boiler Rapids was recorded by the Geological Survey of Canada in 1892.

In Athabasca river approximately 50 km west south-west of Fort McMurray.