The Carbon 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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Carbon’s center stands about 1,600 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 1,500 ft to 1,640 ft, a difference of 140 ft: gently rolling country.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Antlers Sand (sandstone, claystone), from the Early Cretaceous, 100 to 145 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 52×. 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, claystone. Age: Early Cretaceous, 100 to 145 million years old. About 10 mi of the line.
Limestone. Age: Carboniferous to Permian, 252 to 324 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Black-shale. Age: Carboniferous, 299 to 324 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Siltstone-mudstone. Age: Carboniferous to Permian, 252 to 324 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Black-shale. Age: Carboniferous, 299 to 324 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
Black-shale. 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. 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 Carbon reaches the Gulf of America by way of Hunting Shirt Creek, the Sabana, the Leon, the Little River and the Brazos: about 690 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Belton Lake and Proctor Lake.
320 miles of the trip are on the Brazos.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Carbon; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
