The Hanscom AFB 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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76° on Nov. 12, 2022, the hottest reading for this week of the year since 1949. Next is 75° in 2020.
Hanscom AFB’s center stands about 140 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 120 ft to 360 ft, a difference of 240 ft: rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Nobscot Hill, about 620 ft, 12 miles southwest.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Andover Granite (granite, pegmatite), from the Ordovician to Silurian, 422 to 487 million years old.
The section below crosses 13 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 45×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Schist, gneiss. Age: Neoproterozoic to Ordovician, 445 to 1,000 million years old. About 6 mi of the line.
Diorite, gabbro. Age: Neoproterozoic, 542 to 1,000 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Argillite. Age: Neoproterozoic to Early Cambrian, 521 to 1,000 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Granite, pegmatite. Age: Ordovician to Silurian, 422 to 487 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Conglomerate, sandstone, siltstone. Age: Neoproterozoic to Early Cambrian, 521 to 1,000 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Gneiss. Age: Neoproterozoic to Ordovician, 445 to 1,000 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. 7 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 Hanscom AFB reaches the Atlantic Ocean by way of the Shawsheen and the Merrimack: about 50 river miles.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Hanscom AFB; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Hanscom AFB has a hot-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 85° in July; winter nights fall to about 18° in January. About 43 inches of rain fall in a normal year.
On November 14 Hanscom AFB normally reaches 53° and falls to 33°. The record high is 70°, in 1959; the record low 14°, in 2019. The most rain on this date, 3.12 in, fell in 2009.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1949 at Bedford Hanscom Field, here. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
