![]() ![]() The rift is now around 200 kilometres long, leaving just five kilometres between the end of the fissure and the ocean, according to the ESA. In 2011, the crack was visible but not advancing rapidly, but since December of last year, it has grown the length of about five football fields each day. The rift has been around since at least the 1950s, when it was captured on satellite images gathered during the Cold War period. Once the crack completes its path, it will produce one of the largest icebergs ever recorded at a size of 6,600 sq. The ice shelf has an area of about 50,000 square kilometres, which is roughly the size of Nova Scotia. It has been tracking a rift on Antarctica's Larsen C ice shelf since 2011 using satellites. The European Space Agency has been monitoring how ice is changing to improve understanding of the effects to the region and beyond. Over a period of millions of years, the growing pile of snowfall has resulted in an ice sheet that forms ice shelves. With annual average temperatures ranging from -5 C to -60, most of the snow that falls in the region piles up throughout the year. The Antarctic ice sheet is the largest single mass of ice on Earth. Scientists say that rising sea levels, which result in more flooding and could impact drinking water and wildlife habitats, are caused primarily by melting ice sheets and glaciers and the expansion of sea water as it warms. Then it suddenly plunged in 2016 and has stayed lower than average since.ĬNN’s Rachel Ramirez contributed to this report.Ice shelves, which float on water, are an important barrier that prevent land-based ice sheets and glaciers from melting into the ocean and adding to rising sea levels. Satellite data that stretches back to 1978 shows that the region was still producing record-high sea ice extent as recently as 20. “There’s a link between what’s going on in Antarctica and the general warming trend around the rest of the world, but it’s different from what we see in mountain glaciers and what we see in the Arctic,” Ted Scambos, a glaciologist at the University of Colorado Boulder and lead scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Center, previously told CNN. Unlike the Arctic, where scientists say climate change is accelerating its impacts, Antarctica’s sea ice extent is highly variable. Recent data shows the sea ice has not since recovered, suggesting the continent could end the summer with a new record on the books for the second year in a row.Īntarctica has experienced a roller-coaster of sea ice extent over the past couple of decades, swinging wildly from record highs to record lows. Strong winds have also hastened the sea ice decline, they reported. Researchers at the data center say the low sea ice has been due in part to a large band of warmer-than-normal air temperatures, which climbed to 2 degrees Celsius above average over the Ross Sea in November and December. “While the decline in Antarctic sea ice extent is always steep at this time of year, it has been unusually rapid this year,” scientists at the National Snow and Ice Data Center reported in early January, “and at the end of December, Antarctic sea ice extent stood at the lowest in the 45-year satellite record.” ![]() The calving comes amid record-low sea ice extent in Antarctica, where it is summer. (Photo by Wolfgang Kaehler/LightRocket via Getty Images) Wolfgang Kaehler/LightRocket/Getty ImagesĦ5% of Antarctica's plants and animals could disappear, scientists say. ANTARCTICA - 0: Antarctica, Weddell Sea, Snow Hill Island, Emperor Penguin Colony Aptenodytes forsteri With Chicks On Fast Ice. ![]()
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