The McFarlan 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.
Sunny
Sunny; warmer
Sunny
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Mostly sunny
Mostly sunny
3.38 inches of rain fell in two days, the most for this week of the year since records began in 1893. The next wettest, 3.23 inches, fell in 2018.
McFarlan’s center stands about 310 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 100 ft to 380 ft, a difference of 280 ft: rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Gordon Mountain, about 630 ft, 14 miles west-northwest.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Middendorf Formation (sand), from the Cretaceous, 66 to 145 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 41×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Sand. Age: Cretaceous, 66 to 145 million years old. About 10 mi of the line.
Sand, gravel. Age: Cretaceous, 66 to 145 million years old. About 9 mi of the line.
Slate, argillite. Age: Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 to 1,000 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Metarhyolite. 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.
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 McFarlan reaches the Atlantic Ocean by way of Whortleberry Creek, the Pee Dee, the Great Pee Dee, Schooner Creek and the Waccamaw: about 180 river miles.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of McFarlan; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
McFarlan has a humid subtropical climate. Summer afternoons average 91° in July; winter nights fall to about 31° in January. About 49 inches of rain fall in a normal year.
On November 14 McFarlan normally reaches 65° and falls to 40°. The record high is 83°, in 1964; the record low 20°, in 1977. The most rain on this date, 2.00 in, fell in 1940.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1893 at Cheraw, 9 miles southeast, 160 ft lower. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
