The Cannon Ball 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
Sunny; warmer
Partly cloudy
Partly cloudy
Chance of showers; cooler
Partly cloudy
Chance of showers
−11° on Nov. 14, 2014, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1948. Next is −11° in 2019.
Cannon Ball’s center stands about 1,750 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 1,600 ft to 1,830 ft, a difference of 230 ft: rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Ambulance Butte, about 2,270 ft, 15 miles north-northwest.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Fox Hills Formation (shale, sandstone), from the Late Cretaceous, 66 to 100 million years old.
The section below crosses 3 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 47×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Shale, sandstone. Age: Late Cretaceous, 66 to 100 million years old. About 22 mi of the line.
Shale. Age: Late Cretaceous, 66 to 100 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Sandstone, siltstone, claystone. Age: Late Cretaceous, 66 to 100 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.
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 Cannon Ball reaches the Gulf of America by way of Beaver Holes Creek, the Missouri and the Mississippi: about 2,430 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Lake Oahe, Lake Sharpe, Lake Francis Case and Lewis and Clark Lake.
1,170 miles of the trip are on the Mississippi.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Cannon Ball; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Cannon Ball has a warm-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 81° in July; winter nights fall to about 2° in January. A normal year brings about 45 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 19 inches of water.
On November 14 Cannon Ball normally reaches 39° and falls to 19°. The record high is 65°, in 2001; the record low −11°, in 2014. The most rain on this date, 0.16 in, fell in 1994.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1948 at Hazelton 4 NW, 15 miles northeast, 230 ft higher. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
