The Eureka 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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Eureka’s center stands about 6,560 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 5,960 ft to 7,780 ft, a difference of 1,820 ft: steep hill country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Boulter Peak, about 8,260 ft, 5 miles northwest.
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 6×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Unconsolidated. Age: Quaternary, less than 2.6 million years old. About 6 mi of the line.
Monzonite, granodiorite. Age: Late Eocene, 35 to 35 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Latite, quartz-latite. Age: Late Eocene to Oligocene, 23 to 38 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Limestone. Age: Early Mississippian to Late Mississippian, 324 to 359 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Clay. Age: Pleistocene, less than 2.6 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Limestone. Age: Early Ordovician to Late Ordovician, 445 to 487 million years old. About 2 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 Eureka reaches the Great Basin by way of Eureka Creek and Tanner Creek: about 30 river miles. The Great Basin has no outlet to the sea: the water leaves only by evaporating or soaking into the ground.
Often dry. About 100% of the way is mapped as streams that run only after rain or snowmelt; the water makes the whole trip in floods.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Eureka; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
