The Mountain City 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.
Partly cloudy
Mostly cloudy; warmer
Mostly sunny; warmer
Partly cloudy
Sunny
Mostly sunny
Mostly sunny
3.00 inches of rain fell in two days, the most for this week of the year since records began in 1956. The next wettest, 1.78 inches, fell in 2002.
Mountain City’s center stands about 2,400 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 2,270 ft to 3,810 ft, a difference of 1,540 ft: steep hill country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Snake Mountain, about 5,550 ft, 11 miles south-southeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Shady Dolomite (dolostone, limestone), from the Cambrian, 487 to 542 million years old.
The section below crosses 9 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 7×. 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 6 mi of the line.
Quartzite. Age: Cambrian, 487 to 542 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Age: Mesoproterozoic to Neoproterozoic, 965 to 1,003 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Sandstone, arkose, conglomerate. Age: Cambrian, 487 to 542 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Shale, sandstone. Age: Cambrian, 487 to 542 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Gneiss. Age: Mesoproterozoic to Neoproterozoic, 950 to 1,250 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. 3 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 Mountain City reaches the Gulf of America by way of Furnace Creek, Town Creek, Roan Creek, the Watauga, the South Fork Holston, the Holston, the Tennessee, the Ohio and the Mississippi: about 1,880 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 Mountain City; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Mountain City has a oceanic climate. Summer afternoons average 82° in July; winter nights fall to about 23° in January. A normal year brings about 12 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 47 inches of water.
On November 14 Mountain City normally reaches 58° and falls to 31°. The record high is 78°, in 1989; the record low 8°, in 1968. The most rain on this date, 0.77 in, fell in 1996.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1956 at Mountain City 2, here. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
