The Moravian Falls 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
Partly cloudy; warmer
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3.30 inches of rain fell in two days, the most for this week of the year since records began in 1965. The next wettest, 2.30 inches, fell in 2022.
Moravian Falls’s center stands about 1,210 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 1,000 ft to 1,990 ft, a difference of 990 ft: steep hill country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Pores Knob, about 2,680 ft, 4 miles south-southeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Migmatitic Granitic Gneiss (biotite-gneiss), from the Cambrian to Ordovician, 445 to 542 million years old.
The section below crosses 9 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 11×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Biotite-gneiss, mica-schist, calc-silicate-rock. Age: Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 to 1,000 million years old. About 7 mi of the line.
Metagranite. Age: Early Cambrian to Late Ordovician, 455 to 540 million years old. About 6 mi of the line.
Gneiss. Age: Neoproterozoic, 542 to 1,000 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Biotite-gneiss. Age: Cambrian to Ordovician, 445 to 542 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Mica-schist, phyllite. Age: Neoproterozoic, 542 to 1,000 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Biotite-gneiss. Age: Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 to 1,000 million years old. About 0.6 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale. 3 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 Moravian Falls reaches the Atlantic Ocean by way of Moravian Creek, the Yadkin, the Pee Dee, the Great Pee Dee, Schooner Creek and the Waccamaw: about 390 river miles.
Lake on the way: Lake Tillery.
160 miles of the trip are on the Yadkin.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Moravian Falls; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Moravian Falls has a humid subtropical climate. Summer afternoons average 88° in July; winter nights fall to about 27° in January. A normal year brings about 8 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 52 inches of water.
On November 14 Moravian Falls normally reaches 62° and falls to 36°. The record high is 81°, in 2006; the record low 15°, in 1986. The most rain on this date, 1.56 in, fell in 1972.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1965 at W. Kerr Scott Resv., 3 miles northwest, 140 ft lower. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
