The Arab plate. Relief from Copernicus GLO-30; rivers and lakes from USGS NHD; watersheds from the USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset; roads and city limits from Census TIGER 2024.
Sunny
Mostly sunny; warmer
Sunny
Sunny
Mostly sunny
Mostly sunny
Mostly sunny
22° on Nov. 13, 2019, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1995. Next is 25° in 1997.
Arab’s center stands about 1,100 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 940 ft to 1,120 ft, a difference of 180 ft: gently rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Lemley Mountain, about 1,310 ft, 15 miles north.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Pottsville Formation (lower part) (sandstone), from the Carboniferous, 299 to 324 million years old.
The section below crosses 3 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 29×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Sandstone. Age: Carboniferous, 299 to 324 million years old. About 21 mi of the line.
Limestone. Age: Carboniferous, 324 to 359 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Sandstone, conglomerate. Age: Carboniferous, 299 to 324 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale.
Heights from Copernicus GLO-90 (a surface model: it includes buildings and tree canopy); summits from USGS GNIS; rivers from USGS NHDPlus HR; rock from the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation.
A raindrop that lands in Arab reaches the Gulf of America by way of Cotaco Creek, the Tennessee, the Ohio and the Mississippi: about 1,370 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Guntersville Lake, White Lake (historical) and Pickwick Lake.
970 miles of the trip are on the Mississippi.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Arab; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Arab has a humid subtropical climate. Summer afternoons average 89° in July; winter nights fall to about 32° in January. About 57 inches of rain fall in a normal year.
On November 14 Arab normally reaches 62° and falls to 43°. The record high is 74°, in 2011; the record low 22°, in 2019. The most rain on this date, 1.27 in, fell in 2024.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1995 at Guntersville No.2, 10 miles east, 500 ft lower. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
