Featured Image: Even the youngest rocks you find in the Blue Ridge Mountains may be 200 million years old.
Here in Asheville, North Carolina, we are most grateful to have easily made it through the melee of Hurricane Florence with little more than a few days of rain. Thank you to everyone who checked on us! We are keeping all of those who are dealing with losses and very real difficulties due to this powerful hurricane in our thoughts and prayers. To help them, please visit redcross.org, call 1-800-REDCROSS or text the word FLORENCE to 90999 to make a $10 donation. To donate by phone or to get assistance with your donation, please call 1-800-HELP NOW (1-800-435-7669).
Once again, the geology of our beautiful home state was key to our experience with this latest force majeure. For perspective, the closest beach to us is Charleston, South Carolina, and that is 270 miles away to the southeast. New Bern, North Carolina, hit so hard by Florence, is closer to due east – and is 370 miles away. Western North Carolina resides in the ancient Blue Ridge Mountains, known to date back between 500 million and a billion years. While the middle parts of the state are mostly below 1,200 feet in elevation and much of the coastline (from 100 miles eastward) range from 150 feet to sea level, Asheville lies above 2,100 feet. The state’s highest point – Mt. Mitchell at 6,684 feet – is just 33 miles away from us.
Raised relief map “NI-17-1 Knoxville,” copyright Hubbard Scientific and American Educational Products. All rights reserved by original copyright holders.
We have seen our waterways like the nearby French Broad River overflow banks from excessive rain, and large trees can also uproot when the earth gets too wet. But by and large, at least in recent times, even massive storms that have battered the East Coast have tended to spare Asheville and other areas in our region I’ve recently shown here. Cashiers is in Transylvania County, and Highlands in due west of there in Macon County. Elevations in those gorgeous realms are approximately 3,500 and 4,100 feet, respectively.
