The Hector 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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72° on Nov. 11, 2020, the hottest reading for this week of the year since 1926. Next is 71° in 1931.
Hector’s center stands about 2,130 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 1,620 ft to 2,530 ft, a difference of 910 ft: steep hill country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Bailey Hill, about 2,590 ft, 5 miles west-northwest.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Catskill Formation (sandstone, siltstone, shale), from the Late Devonian, 359 to 384 million years old.
The section below crosses 5 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.
Sandstone, siltstone, shale. Age: Late Devonian, 359 to 384 million years old. About 12 mi of the line.
Sandstone, siltstone. Age: Devonian to Carboniferous, 324 to 422 million years old. About 8 mi of the line.
Sandstone, conglomerate. Age: Carboniferous, 299 to 324 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Sandstone, siltstone, mudstone. Age: Late Devonian, 359 to 384 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
Sandstone, shale. Age: Carboniferous, 299 to 324 million years old. About 0.4 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 Hector reaches Chesapeake Bay and the Atlantic Ocean by way of the Genesee Forks, Pine Creek, the West Branch Susquehanna and the Susquehanna: about 270 river miles.
Lake on the way: Lake Aldred.
85 miles of the trip are on the Susquehanna.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Hector; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Hector has a warm-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 79° in July; winter nights fall to about 14° in January. A normal year brings about 61 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 42 inches of water.
On November 14 Hector normally reaches 46° and falls to 29°. The record high is 68°, in 1945; the record low 9°, in 1986. The most rain on this date, 0.45 in, fell in 1929.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1926 at Wellsboro 4 SW, 16 miles southeast, 310 ft lower. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
