Greenland Glacier Spawns Giant Ice Island
Posted: Sat Aug 07, 2010 11:47 am
An ice island four times the size of Manhattan has broken off from one of Greenland's two main glaciers.
Scientists say the calving, discovered by the Canadian Ice Service on Thursday, is the biggest event of its kind in the Arctic in nearly 50 years.
A chunk of ice was predicted to come away from the Petermann Glacier - of the two largest remaining ones in Greenland - but never at this scale.
Nasa images show the island has an area of 100 square miles and a thickness up to half the height of the Empire State Building.
The island, which broke off on Thursday, will enter a remote place called the Nares Strait, about 620 miles south of the North Pole between Greenland and Canada.
Andreas Muenchow, professor of ocean science and engineering at the University of Delaware, said the island's future course remains open.
It could fuse to land, break up into smaller pieces, or slowly move south where it could block shipping, he said.
Prof Muenchow said it is difficult to be sure the event occurred due to global warming because records on the sea water around the glacier have only been kept since 2003.
The flow of sea water below the glaciers is one of the main causes of ice calvings off Greenland.
Greenland Glacier Spawns Giant Ice Island - Yahoo! News UK
Scientists say the calving, discovered by the Canadian Ice Service on Thursday, is the biggest event of its kind in the Arctic in nearly 50 years.
A chunk of ice was predicted to come away from the Petermann Glacier - of the two largest remaining ones in Greenland - but never at this scale.
Nasa images show the island has an area of 100 square miles and a thickness up to half the height of the Empire State Building.
The island, which broke off on Thursday, will enter a remote place called the Nares Strait, about 620 miles south of the North Pole between Greenland and Canada.
Andreas Muenchow, professor of ocean science and engineering at the University of Delaware, said the island's future course remains open.
It could fuse to land, break up into smaller pieces, or slowly move south where it could block shipping, he said.
Prof Muenchow said it is difficult to be sure the event occurred due to global warming because records on the sea water around the glacier have only been kept since 2003.
The flow of sea water below the glaciers is one of the main causes of ice calvings off Greenland.
Greenland Glacier Spawns Giant Ice Island - Yahoo! News UK
