The world’s largest iceberg, about four times the size of New York City, has broken free of its grounding in Antarctica and is moving at about 3 miles a day toward the South Atlantic Ocean.
The iceberg, known as A23a, covers about 1,500 square miles and measures 1,312 feet high. In the past few months, it lost its grip on the seafloor, as part of an iceberg’s natural growth cycle, and has taken on something of a speed spurt. Driven by wind and current, it has moved from the Weddell Sea and is now passing the northern tip of the Antarctic Peninsula.
Once part of the Filchner ice shelf, home of many international research stations, A23a broke away in 1986, calved and grounded on the Weddell Sea floor. It is now joining the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, moving toward the South Atlantic on “iceberg alley.”
It is now moving with the same current that Sir Ernest Shackleton used in 1916 to escape from Antarctica after his ship, Endurance, was crushed in sea ice there. Shackleton saved his crew in a heroic sail to South Georgia Island.
If A23a ends up on South Georgia, scientists say the enormous iceberg could cause life-threatening problems for the millions of seals, penguins and seabirds that breed there. Its size alone would certainly disrupt their normal feeding patterns.
Read more at https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-67507558 and see the video below:
