The West Lafayette 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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3.08 inches of rain fell in two days, the most for this week of the year since records began in 1948. The next wettest, 2.49 inches, fell in 2022.
West Lafayette’s center stands about 810 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 750 ft to 1,090 ft, a difference of 340 ft: rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Elephant Knob, about 1,250 ft, 13 miles east.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Maxville Limestone; Rushville, Logan, and Cuyhoga Formations, Undivided (shale, siltstone, sandstone), from the Devonian to Carboniferous, 324 to 422 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 37×. 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, siltstone. Age: Carboniferous, 299 to 324 million years old. About 20 mi of the line.
Shale, siltstone, sandstone. Age: Devonian to Carboniferous, 324 to 422 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Shale, siltstone, mudstone. Age: Carboniferous, 299 to 324 million years old. About 1 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 West Lafayette reaches the Gulf of America by way of the Tuscarawas, the Muskingum, the Ohio and the Mississippi: about 1,890 river miles.
970 miles of the trip are on the Mississippi.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of West Lafayette; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
West Lafayette has a hot-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 84° in July; winter nights fall to about 21° in January. About 39 inches of rain fall in a normal year.
On November 14 West Lafayette normally reaches 52° and falls to 33°. The record high is 73°, in 1989; the record low 11°, in 1986. The most rain on this date, 1.18 in, fell in 1972.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1948 from the New Philadelphia Area threaded record (New Philadelphia Clever Field, 22 miles northeast). NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
