The Rutherfordton 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
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Mostly sunny
Mostly sunny
4.02 inches of rain fell in two days, the most for this week of the year since records began in 1928. The next wettest, 3.28 inches, fell in 2018.
Rutherfordton’s center stands about 950 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 820 ft to 1,120 ft, a difference of 300 ft: rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Youngs Mountain, about 2,700 ft, 14 miles west-northwest.
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 6 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 13×. 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. Age: Cambrian to Ordovician, 445 to 542 million years old. About 9 mi of the line.
Biotite-gneiss, mica-schist, calc-silicate-rock. Age: Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 to 1,000 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Mica-schist. Age: Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 to 1,000 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Metagranite. Age: Early Cambrian to Late Ordovician, 455 to 540 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Amphibolite, biotite-gneiss. Age: Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 to 1,000 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Biotite-gneiss. Age: Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 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 Rutherfordton reaches the Atlantic Ocean by way of Cleghorn Creek, the Broad, the Congaree, the Santee and the South Santee: about 320 river miles.
Lake on the way: Lib Pines Lake.
140 miles of the trip are on the Broad.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Rutherfordton; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Rutherfordton has a humid subtropical climate. Summer afternoons average 89° in July; winter nights fall to about 27° in January. About 52 inches of rain fall in a normal year, with about 1 inch of snow.
On November 14 Rutherfordton normally reaches 63° and falls to 35°. The record high is 79°, in 1931; the record low 18°, in 1986. The most rain on this date, 1.64 in, fell in 1972.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1928 at Chesnee 7 WSW, 17 miles south, 200 ft lower. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
