One of the largest iceberg known to science is about to break away from Antarctica. The Larsen C ice shelf has an enormous crack threatening to calve off a 5,000-square-kilometer or 1,931 square miles section of it.
Larsen C is the most substantial ice shelf in northern Antarctica. It is holding back a lot of land-based glaciers and its disintegration will open the floodgates, and increase global sea levels by about 10 centimeters or 3.9 inches. It may not sound significant but the global sea level rise over the last 20 years has been about 6.6 centimeters 2.6 inches only. Furthermore, the sea level rise generated as a result of man-made climate change is something everybody must be concern about.
The canyon has started to crack multiplied at a breakneck pace. In the second half of December 2016, the crack grew by 18 kilometers.Now, a gigantic piece of ice is held back by just a 20-kilometer-long stretch of ice. The complete Larsen C ice shelf is about twice the size of Hawaii, will shave off of about 10 percent by the crack.
Although the progressively speedy warming of the region has likely fast-tracked the movement of the gigantic fissure cutting parts of Larsen C away from Antarctica, there is no direct indication to back this for now. There is, however, sufficient evidence associating warmer atmospheric and ocean temperatures to ice disappearance elsewhere on the continent.
Swansea University researchers, who have been using satellite data to monitor its disintegration note that this particular calving is an expected event because of the region's unique geography. BBC reported that the loss of a piece a quarter of the size of Wales would leave the whole shelf susceptible to future break-up.
UK's Project Midas has reported last year that the Larsen C rift was increasing fast. Furthermore, in December the speed of the split went into overdrive, increasing by a further 18km in just two weeks. According to estimates, if all the ice that the Larsen C shelf presently holds back gets in the sea, global waters would rise by 10cm.
This article is copyrighted by Travelers Today, the travel news leader
