The Kaibab 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.
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3° on Nov. 14, 1985, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1963. Next is 11° in 1964.
Kaibab’s center stands about 4,980 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 4,740 ft to 6,150 ft, a difference of 1,410 ft: steep hill country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Ed Lamb Point, about 7,030 ft, 8 miles north-northeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Shinarump Conglomerate Member, Chinle Formation (conglomerate, sandstone), from the Late Triassic, 210 to 230 million years old.
The section below crosses 5 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 9×. 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: Late Triassic to Early Jurassic, 180 to 210 million years old. About 7 mi of the line.
Sandstone, mudstone. Age: Middle Triassic to Late Triassic, 230 to 245 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Mudstone. Age: Late Triassic, 210 to 230 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Arenite, sandstone-mudstone. Age: Early Jurassic to Middle Jurassic, 164 to 202 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Conglomerate, sandstone. Age: Late Triassic, 210 to 230 million years old. About 3 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 Kaibab reaches the Gulf of California by way of South Moccasin Wash, Twomile Wash, Bitter Seeps Wash, Bulrush Wash, Kanab Creek and the Colorado: about 710 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Lake Mead, Lake Mohave and Lake Havasu.
290 miles of the trip are on the Colorado.
Seldom reaches the sea. Dams and canals now take nearly all of the Colorado before its old delta in Mexico.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Kaibab; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Kaibab has a cold semi-arid climate. Summer afternoons average 94° in July; winter nights fall to about 22° in December. A normal year brings about 6 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 11 inches of water.
On November 14 Kaibab normally reaches 60° and falls to 30°. The record high is 77°, in 2025; the record low 3°, in 1985. The most rain on this date, 0.31 in, fell in 1978.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1963 at Pipe Spring National Monument, 2 miles south. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
