The Rolla 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.
Mostly sunny
Partly cloudy; warmer
Sunny
Sunny
Partly cloudy
Partly cloudy
Partly cloudy
5.94 inches of rain fell in two days, the most for this week of the year since records began in 1893. The next wettest, 3.35 inches, fell in 1993.
Rolla’s center stands about 1,120 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 890 ft to 1,200 ft, a difference of 310 ft: rolling country.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Smithville Dolomite, Powell Dolomite, Cotter Dolomite, Jefferson City Dolomite (dolostone), from the Early Ordovician, 471 to 487 million years old.
The section below crosses 4 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 34×. 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: Early Ordovician, 471 to 487 million years old. About 12 mi of the line.
Sandstone, chert. Age: Early Ordovician, 471 to 487 million years old. About 9 mi of the line.
Dolostone. Age: Early Ordovician, 471 to 487 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Shale, limestone, sandstone. Age: Carboniferous, 299 to 324 million years old. About 0.8 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 Rolla reaches the Gulf of America by way of Burgher Branch, Dutro Carter Creek, the Dry Fork, the Meramec and the Mississippi: about 1,330 river miles.
1,130 miles of the trip are on the Mississippi.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Rolla; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Rolla has a hot-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 89° in July; winter nights fall to about 22° in January. A normal year brings about 17 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 47 inches of water.
On November 14 Rolla normally reaches 56° and falls to 37°. The record high is 82°, in 1999; the record low 8°, in 1986. The most rain on this date, 2.75 in, fell in 1993.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1893 at Rolla Missouri S&T, here. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
