“We don’t have that much scientific information for icebergs like this,” says Geraint Tarling, an ecologist for the British Antarctic Survey. Photograph by IceBridge Digital Mapping System As the iceberg moved into the Atlantic's warmer waters in 2020, it began to break apart, spawning smaller icebergs and slowly eroding. Scientists estimate the cliffs are nearly seven stories, about 100 feet, tall. ( Find out about how climate change is melting the Antarctic Peninsula.)Īn image of A68 from November 2017 shows the craggy, steep edges of the iceberg's borders. It had been slowly inching north until this year, when an ocean current quickly propelled it into the Southern Atlantic Ocean. The iceberg, labeled A68, broke off from the Larsen C ice shelf on the east coast of the Antarctic Peninsula in 2017. What was the largest iceberg on Earth is threatening to come to a halt soon in a pristine Antarctic wildlife sanctuary that’s home to penguins, seals, and a small population of endangered blue whales. It’s unclear whether the remainder of A68 and its siblings will become stuck there and cut South Georgia’s wildlife off from feeding grounds, but the chunks of ice are rapidly releasing freshwater into an ecosystem adapted to saltwater. Recent satellite images show that the icebergs are caught in a strong ocean current that seems likely to sweep the chunks of ice around the southern edge of the island and spin them north. Since the iceberg calved from the Larsen C ice shelf three years ago, it has lost two-thirds of its volume. On December 22, the front, pointed tip of the iceberg broke, producing 68-square-mile A68e and 252-square-mile A68f. On December 17, about 69 square miles broke from the iceberg, forming A68d. Update: As of today, the A68 iceberg, once the world’s largest, has lost significant chunks of ice and continues to break apart, satellite images show.
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