The Fall Creek 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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3.35 inches of rain fell in two days, the most for this week of the year since records began in 1902. The next wettest, 2.86 inches, fell in 1985.
Fall Creek’s center stands about 480 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 460 ft to 700 ft, a difference of 240 ft: rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Lookout Mountain, about 830 ft, 10 miles south-southeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Glen Park Formation, Hannibal Shale, Chouteau Limestone, McCraney Limestone, Prospect Hill Siltstone, and Starrs Cave Limestone (limestone, shale), from the Early Mississippian, 347 to 359 million years old.
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.
Limestone. Age: Carboniferous, 324 to 359 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Limestone. Age: Early Mississippian to Middle Mississippian, 331 to 359 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Limestone. Age: Middle Mississippian, 331 to 347 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Sandstone. Age: Late Cretaceous, 72 to 84 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Clay, silt, sand. Age: Holocene, less than 12,000 years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Shale. Age: Middle Devonian to Late Devonian, 359 to 388 million years old. 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 Fall Creek reaches the Gulf of America by way of Fall Creek, the The Sny and the Mississippi: about 1,290 river miles.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Fall Creek; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Fall Creek has a hot-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 86° in July; winter nights fall to about 18° in January. About 41 inches of rain fall in a normal year.
On November 14 Fall Creek normally reaches 52° and falls to 34°. The record high is 80°, in 1999; the record low 6°, in 1940. The most rain on this date, 1.37 in, fell in 1913.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1902 at Hannibal Water Works, 6 miles southwest, 230 ft higher. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
