The Tse Bonito 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.
Chance of showers
Mostly sunny
Partly cloudy
Showers likely
Mostly sunny
Partly cloudy
Chance of showers; cooler
2° on Nov. 12, 2000, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1973. Next is 2° in 2018.
Tse Bonito’s center stands about 7,040 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 6,770 ft to 7,330 ft, a difference of 560 ft: hilly country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Piney Hill, about 8,120 ft, 12 miles northwest.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Crevasse Canyon Formation (shale, sandstone), from the Late Cretaceous, 84 to 90 million years old.
The section below crosses 8 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 14×. 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, 84 to 90 million years old. About 7 mi of the line.
Mudstone, shale, sandstone. Age: Late Cretaceous, 72 to 87 million years old. About 6 mi of the line.
Mudstone. Age: Late Triassic, 210 to 230 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Conglomerate, sandstone. Age: Late Triassic, 210 to 230 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Sandstone, limestone. Age: Permian, 270 to 280 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Sandstone, siltstone. Age: Early Jurassic to Late Jurassic, 160 to 180 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. 2 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 Tse Bonito reaches the Gulf of California by way of Disappearing Spring Wash, Tse Bonito Wash, Black Creek, the Puerco, the Little Colorado and the Colorado: about 1,060 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Lake Mead, Lake Mohave and Lake Havasu.
290 miles of the trip are on the Colorado.
Often dry. About 30% of the way is mapped as streams that run only after rain or snowmelt; the water makes the whole trip in floods.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Tse Bonito; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Tse Bonito has a cold semi-arid climate. Summer afternoons average 89° in July; winter nights fall to about 14° in January. A normal year brings about 34 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 11 inches of water.
On November 14 Tse Bonito normally reaches 56° and falls to 20°. The record high is 73°, in 1999; the record low 4°, in 2000. The most rain on this date, 0.44 in, fell in 1997.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1973 at Gallup Municipal Airport, 15 miles southeast, 580 ft lower. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
