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United States United States Waterfall UNESCO World Heritage

Terraced Falls

A 40 m drop.

When to go

Terraced FallsYNP
RG Johnsson · Public domain

In numbers.

40m

Height

1.5m³/s

Average flow

estimate

May–Jun

Best months

599kW

Water power

estimate

The water at Terraced Falls, month by month

It roars from April to May.

The fullest months: from April to May, with the snowmelt. The thinnest: from August to October and from December to February. Below −4 °C on average (from December to March): the falls can partly freeze.

  1. 0.5 m³/sJan
  2. 0.6 m³/sFeb
  3. 2.0 m³/sMar
  4. 4.5 m³/sApr
  5. 4.5 m³/sMay
  6. 2.9 m³/sJun
  7. 1.2 m³/sJul
  8. 0.6 m³/sAug
  9. 0.7 m³/sSep
  10. 0.8 m³/sOct
  11. 1.2 m³/sNov
  12. 1.1 m³/sDec
high water best months to go may freeze

From about 0.50 m³/s in the lowest month to 4.5 m³/s in the highest. Best months to go, with plenty of water and pleasant days: from May to June.

Estimate: the timing comes from rain, snowmelt and evaporation (NASA POWER, 1991–2020); the amounts from the river model of HydroATLAS (WaterGAP, 1971–2000). Dams upstream can change the real flow.

Waterfall in Teton County, Wyoming

Terraced Falls is a waterfall in United States. The water falls 40 m. It lies within Yellowstone National Park. It is part of a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Read more on Wikipedia

Getting there.

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How big is it?

How big it really is.

40 mTerracedFalls1.8 ma person9.0 ma house56 mTower of Pisa

Height of the drop from Wikidata. Buildings and the person are drawn at the same scale.

599 kW

About 1.5 m³/s falling 40 m: the power of the water as it drops.

  • enough to power about 150 homes, if it were all turned into electricity

Power of falling water = density × gravity × flow × height. Average flow and height as shown above; an estimate.

Seen from the sky.

8 × 8 km of cloud-free satellite image, with what OpenStreetMap knows around the falls.

Terraced Falls seen from above (Sentinel-2) N 2 km

Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 (EOX, CC BY 4.0), 8 × 8 km, north up. Points © OpenStreetMap contributors.

The Fall River through the falls
2,050 m2,100 mTerraced Falls-1.5 km-1 km-0.5 km0+0.5 km+1 km+1.5 km← upstreamdownstream →

The line follows the river as mapped in OpenStreetMap; heights from the 30 m Copernicus model, which smooths narrow drops — the published height of the falls is the one above.

The valley below the falls
−690 m+690 m

Around the falls the river drops 101 m in 3.6 km. Here the river runs about 122 m below the lower rim of its valley.

What is around.

  • —viewpoints
  • —waymarked walking routes
  • —car parks
  • —swimming spots
  • —picnic sites
  • —toilets
  • —information boards and visitor centres
  • —bus stops within 1 km
  • 2other named waterfalls within 4 kmCascade Acres, Cascade Creek Falls
  • —caves
  • 8campsites9C4S, Falls River Cutoff, Mountain Ash Creek and 5 more
  • —hotels, B&Bs and huts within 6 km
  • —restaurants and cafés within 3 km

Counted in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit, up to 2 km around the falls (unless noted). A low number may just mean nobody has mapped it yet. © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL).

Weather

The weather, month by month.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Afternoon °C-4-315121925241991-4
Night °C-15-14-9-5151094-2-9-15
Rain & snow (mm)837373757261303650657690
Wet days171516161612999111417
Sun h/day4.15.66.58.08.110.012.010.38.45.53.93.3
Snow on the ground (cm)66817537112003111939

Long-term averages 1991–2020 (NASA POWER) for a cell about 55 km wide, with temperatures carried to the height of the falls (2,086 m) at −6.5 °C per 1,000 m. Not a forecast.

Recent years

Wet years and dry years

Rain of each month as a share of the 1991–2020 average. A wet season above 100 % usually means a fuller waterfall.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
2020121%91%120%92%101%171%94%31%62%89%109%44%
202165%96%41%34%116%11%99%201%51%100%60%113%
202249%16%39%95%119%111%34%176%99%63%110%92%
202363%93%136%68%73%161%77%247%125%125%53%65%
202478%132%147%61%91%50%61%115%110%35%59%87%
202550%165%99%63%82%37%69%117%78%138%39%179%

130% wetter than usual 70% drier than usual

Compare with the waterfalls nearby.

Terraced Falls

United States

  • 40 mHeight
  • 1.5 m³/sAverage flow
  • May–JunBest months

Union Falls

United States

  • —Height
  • 0.46 m³/sAverage flow
  • May–JunBest months

See the guide

Bechler Falls

United States

  • 5 mHeight
  • 5.0 m³/sAverage flow
  • May–JunBest months

See the guide

Lewis Falls

United States

  • 9 mHeight
  • 4.5 m³/sAverage flow
  • May–JunBest months

See the guide

About these numbers

Names, height, width, riverWikidata (Q14714850) · CC0
River flow and catchmentHydroATLAS / RiverATLAS v1.0 (Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0
ClimateNASA POWER, 1991–2020
Relief, river profile, 3D modelCopernicus DEM GLO-30 · © DLR e.V., © Airbus Defence and Space GmbH, Copernicus/ESA
Paths, viewpoints, parking© OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL
ImagesEOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons

Every figure is an average, an estimate or a count from a public dataset. Licences and methods: data sources.

The family

Do you prefer beaches, lakes, mountains, waterfalls, islands, rivers, canyons, caves or dark skies?

Same idea, other landscapes: field atlases built on open data, month by month, in seven languages.

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