The Truth or Consequences 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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84° on Nov. 14, 2017, the hottest reading for this week of the year since 1950. Next is 81° in 1973.
Truth or Consequences’s center stands about 4,840 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 4,520 ft to 4,970 ft, a difference of 450 ft: hilly country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Trap Peak, about 6,230 ft, 15 miles west-southwest.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Upper Santa Fe Group (conglomerate-sandstone, coarse-detrital, fine-detrital), from the Late Miocene to Pleistocene, 0.1 to 7.2 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 12×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Conglomerate-sandstone, coarse-detrital, fine-detrital. Age: Late Miocene to Pleistocene, 0.1 to 7.2 million years old. About 15 mi of the line.
Unconsolidated. Age: Pleistocene to Holocene, less than 2.6 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Sedimentary. Age: Permian, 252 to 299 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
Mixed-clastic, fine-detrital, coarse-detrital. Age: Late Oligocene to Pleistocene, 0.1 to 28 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
Andesite, dacite. Age: Late Eocene to Early Miocene, 16 to 38 million years old. About 0.8 mi of the line.
Sandstone, conglomerate, shale. 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 Truth or Consequences reaches the Gulf of America by way of the Rio Grande: about 1,400 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Paz Ramirez Lake, Amistad Reservoir and Caballo Reservoir.
760 miles of the trip are on the Rio Grande.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Truth or Consequences; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Truth or Consequences has a cold desert climate. Summer afternoons average 94° in June; winter nights fall to about 29° in December. About 9 inches of rain fall in a normal year.
On November 14 Truth or Consequences normally reaches 64° and falls to 37°. The record high is 84°, in 2017; the record low 24°, in 1976. The most rain on this date, 0.59 in, fell in 1961.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1950 at Truth Or Consequences Municipal Airport, here. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
