As expected, Iceberg Massive Just Broke Off in Antarctica

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Well, it finally happened. As Mental Floss reported last week, in the last few decades, Larsen’s ice shelf has undergone major changes, most recently with a growing trend alongside the a section called Larsen C threatens bankruptcy altogether. This week, she finally parted ways, creating an Delaware-sized iceberg. At over a trillion tons, it is one of the largest icebergs ever recorded.

The sections known as Larsen A and B collapsed in 1995 and 2002, respectively, reshaping the coast of the Antarctic peninsula.

The Larsen C crack spread slowly – you might say glacial – at first. But by June 2017, it was traveling straight ahead, expanding at a speed of around 32 feet per day. Experts at Swansea University’s Midas Project, which oversees the ice shelf, expected the breakage to occur within “hours, days, or weeks.”

It took about a week. New images from NASA’s Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (NPP) satellite show a distinct split in the ice shelf.

“The trend was barely visible in this data a few weeks ago,” Swansea University ‘s Adrian Luckman told the BBC, “but the signature is so clear now that it needs to be opened wide. at length. “

The exact reason for the separation remains to be seen. While climate change is dependent on the melting of sea ice around the world, experts say this particular breakdown may have been inevitable.

“We know that such movements will occasionally spread and cause large tabular icebergs to break off ice shelves, even without any climate-driven changes,” said Chris. Borstad, from the University Center in Svalbard, told the BBC. “I am working with a number of colleagues to design field experiments on Larsen C to answer this particular question (by measuring closure zone characteristics). Joerg directly). But until we get down there and do a few more measurements, we can only make an estimate. “

[h/t BBC]

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