The Charleston 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.
Sunny
Sunny; warmer
Mostly sunny
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13° on Nov. 15, 1969, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1955. Next is 17° in 1963.
Charleston’s center stands about 730 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 680 ft to 960 ft, a difference of 280 ft: rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Bean Mountain, about 3,040 ft, 13 miles east-southeast.
The section below crosses 11 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 26×. 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. Age: Cambrian, 487 to 542 million years old. About 7 mi of the line.
Dolostone, limestone. Age: Cambrian to Ordovician, 445 to 542 million years old. About 7 mi of the line.
Dolostone, limestone. Age: Ordovician, 445 to 487 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Limestone. Age: Ordovician, 445 to 487 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Dolostone. Age: Cambrian, 487 to 542 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
Shale. Age: Ordovician, 445 to 487 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. 5 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 Charleston reaches the Gulf of America by way of the Hiwassee, the Tennessee, the Ohio and the Mississippi: about 1,540 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Guntersville Lake, White Lake (historical), Pickwick Lake and Cummings Lake.
970 miles of the trip are on the Mississippi.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Charleston; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Charleston has a humid subtropical climate. Summer afternoons average 89° in July; winter nights fall to about 29° in January. About 58 inches of rain fall in a normal year, with about 1 inch of snow.
On November 14 Charleston normally reaches 62° and falls to 37°. The record high is 79°, in 1999; the record low 19°, in 2013. The most rain on this date, 1.22 in, fell in 2007.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1955 at Cleveland Filter Plant, 5 miles south-southwest, 110 ft higher. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
