Iceberg More Than Twice the Size of Chicago Breaks Off Antarctica
On September 26, 2019, an iceberg measuring 632 square miles, weighing 315 billion tons, calved from an ice shelf in east Antarctica.[1] Calving is the sudden release of ice from the edge of a glacier, iceberg, or ice shelf. This event is the first major calving on the Amery ice shelf in over 50 years.[2]
Scientists do not attribute this large break of ice to climate change—despite it being the largest event in decades. Helen Amanda Fricker, a professor at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, states, “It’s part of the ice shelf’s normal cycle, where we see major calving events every 60-70 years.”[3]
While this event is not believed to be a direct result of climate change, calving in other areas is beginning to increase in depth and speed. Sue Cook from the Institute of Marine and Antarctic Studies expects iceberg calving incidents to increase in coming years due to climate change.[4] Cook explains, “There are a number of different processes that’ll happen . . . [a]s waters around Antarctica warm up, they’ll start thinning the ice shelves and making them more vulnerable to breaking up.”[5]
Featured Image: COPERNICUS DATA/SENTINEL-1/@STEFLHERMITTE, https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-49885450.
[1] See Lisa Cox, Giant iceberg breaks off east Antarctica, The Guardian (Sept. 30, 2019), https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/oct/01/giant-iceberg-breaks-off-east-antarctica (last visited Oct. 10, 2019); Jonathan Amos, 315 billion-tonne iceberg breaks off Antarctica, BBC News (Sept. 30, 2019), https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-49885450 (last visited Oct. 11, 2019).
[2] Id.
[3] Id.
[4] See Carly Cassella, A Giant Iceberg Just Broke Off Antarctica in an Unexpected Location, Science Alert (Oct, 2, 2019), https://www.sciencealert.com/a-giant-iceberg-has-just-broken-off-antarctica-and-it-s-bigger-than-expected (last visited Oct. 10, 2019).
[5] Id.
