The Varnell 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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81° on Nov. 12, 1989, the hottest reading for this week of the year since 1879. Next is 80° in 1958.
Varnell’s center stands about 910 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 720 ft to 1,080 ft, a difference of 360 ft: rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Doogan Mountain, about 1,940 ft, 15 miles east-northeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Knox Group undifferentiated (dolostone), from the Cambrian to Ordovician, 445 to 542 million years old.
The section below crosses 8 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 30×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Dolostone. Age: Cambrian to Ordovician, 445 to 542 million years old. About 6 mi of the line.
Limestone, sandstone. Age: Ordovician, 445 to 487 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Shale. Age: Ordovician, 445 to 487 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Limestone. Age: Ordovician, 445 to 487 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Limestone, shale. Age: Cambrian, 487 to 542 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Dolostone, limestone. Age: Cambrian to Ordovician, 445 to 542 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. 2 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 Varnell reaches Mobile Bay and the Gulf of America by way of Station Branch, Kenyon Creek, Coahulla Creek, the Conasauga, the Oostanaula, the Coosa, the Alabama and the Mobile: about 740 river miles.
Lake on the way: Lay Lake.
310 miles of the trip are on the Alabama.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Varnell; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Varnell has a humid subtropical climate. Summer afternoons average 91° in July; winter nights fall to about 32° in January. About 55 inches of rain fall in a normal year, with about 4 inches of snow.
On November 14 Varnell normally reaches 62° and falls to 40°. The record high is 79°, in 1999; the record low 18°, in 1969. The most rain on this date, 2.47 in, fell in 1929.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1879 from the Chattanooga Area threaded record (Chattanooga Airport, 16 miles northwest, 240 ft lower). NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
