Yahoo Lifestyle Ice shelf half the size of Canberra breaks off from Antarctica
It's the third major break to occur on the troubled ice shelf since 2021.
Imagine the shock of Australia’s national leaders if they were sipping a latte on a chilly Canberra morning and half the city broke off and floated away. That’s kind of what’s happening in Antarctica right now, where a 380-square-kilometre piece of the 150-metre-thick Brunt Ice Shelf, almost half the size of Australia's capital, was found to have broken free.
A sudden crack in the ice was picked up using GPS equipment a few weeks ago, and the full break occurred during the early hours of Monday morning. It stretches 14km and formed at ninety degrees to the existing Halloween Crack.
The change has been confirmed using satellite imagery, and reported by the British Antarctic Survey (BAS). Calvings in the previously stable Shelf were first reported in 2012 – a 1,270 km piece then broke off in 2021 and a larger 1,550 km separated last year. But its not the only ice shelf that's rapidly changing, in 2022 Yahoo News also reported on the collapse of the Conger Ice Shelf.
More changes occurring in Antarctica
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It’s not just emperor penguins that have called the Shelf home. It’s also home to Britain’s Halley Research Station which discovered the hole in the ozone layer back in 1985. Because of the threat of cracks, the station was moved 23 kilometres in 2016 and it’s no longer staffed during the winter.
Unlike other problems plaguing Antarctica, the crack in the Brunt Ice Shelf is not believed to be significantly linked to climate change.
Some degree of ice calving is natural, but Swansea University’s Antarctic ice shelf expert Professor Adrian Luckman said it was “concerning” that three ice shelves have broken off in three years in such a cold part of Antarctica. He said researchers are now closely studying the Shelf.
“The Brunt Ice Shelf is providing plenty of data to help us understand the calving process and predict the future evolution of these important ice bodies,” he said.
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