The Star 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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4.93 inches of rain fell in two days, the most for this week of the year since records began in 1952. The next wettest, 4.58 inches, fell in 2020.
Star’s center stands about 650 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 470 ft to 670 ft, a difference of 200 ft: rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is King Mountain, about 1,040 ft, 13 miles northwest.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Metavolcanic-Epiclastic Rock (metasedimentary), from the Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 to 1,000 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 38×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Metasedimentary. Age: Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 to 1,000 million years old. About 9 mi of the line.
Metadacite, metarhyolite, metavolcanic. Age: Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 to 1,000 million years old. About 7 mi of the line.
Sand. Age: Tertiary, 2.6 to 66 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Sand. Age: Cretaceous, 66 to 145 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Slate, argillite. Age: Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 to 1,000 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Metadacite, metarhyolite, metavolcanic. 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 Star reaches the Atlantic Ocean by way of Cotton Creek, Cabin Creek, Bear Creek, the Deep River and the Cape Fear: about 270 river miles.
190 miles of the trip are on the Cape Fear.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Star; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Star has a humid subtropical climate. Summer afternoons average 90° in July; winter nights fall to about 32° in January. About 48 inches of rain fall in a normal year, with about 3 inches of snow.
On November 14 Star normally reaches 63° and falls to 42°. The record high is 82°, in 1964; the record low 20°, in 1986. The most rain on this date, 1.47 in, fell in 1997.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1952 at Jackson Springs 5 WNW, 16 miles south-southeast. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
