The Duane 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.
−12° on Nov. 15, 1933, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1903. Next is −9° in 2019.
Duane’s center stands about 2,620 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 1,480 ft to 2,920 ft, a difference of 1,440 ft: steep hill country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Loon Lake Mountains, about 3,320 ft, 5 miles southeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Biotite and/or hornblende granite gneiss, from the Mesoproterozoic, 1 to 1.6 billion 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 11×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Charnockite, gneiss. Age: Mesoproterozoic, 1 to 1.6 billion years old. About 14 mi of the line.
Gneiss. Age: Mesoproterozoic, 1 to 1.6 billion years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Unconsolidated. Age: Quaternary, less than 2.6 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Gneiss. Age: Mesoproterozoic, 1 to 1.6 billion years old. About 1 mi of the line.
Amphibolite, gneiss. Age: Mesoproterozoic, 1 to 1.6 billion years old. About 1 mi of the line.
Charnockite, gneiss. Age: Mesoproterozoic, 1 to 1.6 billion years old. About 0.9 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 Duane reaches the St. Lawrence River by way of Hays Brook, the Osgood, the East Branch Saint Regis, the Saint Regis and the Saint Lawrence: about 90 river miles. The St. Lawrence carries it on to the Atlantic.
50 miles of the trip are on the Saint Regis.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Duane; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Duane has a warm-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 77° in July; winter nights fall to about 2° in January. About 37 inches of rain fall in a normal year.
On November 14 Duane normally reaches 42° and falls to 23°. The record high is 66°, in 1909; the record low −4°, in 2018. The most rain on this date, 0.71 in, fell in 1959.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1903 from the Saranac Lake Area threaded record (Saranac Lake Adirondack Regional Airport, 14 miles south, 960 ft lower). NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.