The Valley 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
Partly cloudy; warmer
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5.52 inches of rain fell in two days, the most for this week of the year since records began in 1944. The next wettest, 3.78 inches, fell in 1983.
Valley’s center stands about 590 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 540 ft to 730 ft, a difference of 190 ft: gently rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is German Mountain, about 1,020 ft, 12 miles east-southeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Opelika Complex; Loachapoka Schist (muscovite-schist), from the Precambrian to Paleozoic.
The section below crosses 11 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 51×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Gneiss. Age: Precambrian to Paleozoic. About 6 mi of the line.
Amphibolite. Age: Precambrian to Paleozoic. About 4 mi of the line.
Biotite-gneiss, mica-schist. Age: Precambrian to Paleozoic. About 4 mi of the line.
Mylonite. Age: Precambrian to Paleozoic. About 2 mi of the line.
Gneiss, mica-schist, amphibolite. Age: Precambrian to Paleozoic. About 2 mi of the line.
Biotite-gneiss. Age: Precambrian to Paleozoic. About 2 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale. 5 smaller units along the line are not listed.
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 Valley reaches the Gulf of America by way of Osanippa Creek, the Chattahoochee and the Apalachicola: about 300 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Walter F George Reservoir and Bartletts Ferry Lake.
110 miles of the trip are on the Apalachicola.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Valley; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Valley has a humid subtropical climate. Summer afternoons average 90° in July; winter nights fall to about 30° in January. About 56 inches of rain fall in a normal year.
On November 14 Valley normally reaches 66° and falls to 38°. The record high is 81°, in 1989; the record low 19°, in 2013. The most rain on this date, 2.20 in, fell in 1983.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1944 at Lafayette 2 W, 16 miles west-northwest, 150 ft higher. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
