The world’s greatest iceberg — a wall of ice the dimensions of Rhode Island — is lumbering towards a distant island off Antarctica that’s dwelling to thousands and thousands of penguins and seals.
The trillion-ton slab of ice — known as a megaberg — may slam into South Georgia Island and get caught or be guided round it by currents. If it will get caught it may make it laborious for penguin dad and mom to feed their infants and a few younger may even starve. General, nonetheless, researchers aren’t too anxious about main hurt from the iceberg, named A23a.
What’s occurring is extra spectacular than harmful, scientists stated.
It’s additionally a pure course of occurring extra steadily due to human-caused local weather change, stated British Antarctic Survey bodily oceanographer Andrew Meijers, who examined the iceberg up shut in December 2023 when it drifted previous the analysis ship RRS Sir David Attenborough.
“The iceberg itself is colossal and it stretches from horizon to horizon,” Meijers stated Thursday of the 130-foot (40-meter) tall mass. “It’s a huge wall, a Game of Thrones style wall of ice that towers above the ship. With some waves breaking against it and if you get a bit of sunshine coming through, it’s really dramatic.”
pl Tom Cann RAF/Crown Copyright 2024 by way of AP
For each little bit of the iceberg above the water’s floor, there’s ten occasions extra beneath, Meijers stated.
It’s not precisely high-speed motion. The iceberg is making its method at a glacial tempo of 1 meter each three to seven seconds, a lot slower than one mile per hour, Meijers stated.
Within the subsequent two to 4 weeks the iceberg will method South Georgia the place the water will get shallow, so it may wedge itself in, Meijers stated. Or it may slide previous.
“Large icebergs bump into the shoals around South Georgia more or less every year — it’s a kind of highway for the major icebergs,” College of Colorado ice scientist Ted Scambos wrote in an e mail. “This ocean current path has been known since Shackleton’s time, he said, referring to Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton who led British expeditions to the southern continent. Shackleton made the trip to the island in just three weeks. “Usually the icebergs take a bit longer (he had sails),” he stated.
Ultimately, this large iceberg will break up into smaller ones and soften as icebergs do, Meijers stated.
At full measurement, it doesn’t characterize a lot of a hazard for fishermen within the space, as a result of they will see it. The larger concern is penguins that are of their summer time breeding cycle, Meijers stated.
“South Georgia is an amazingly ecologically rich island. It’s a breeding ground for a huge number of penguins, millions of penguins and seals,” Meijers stated. “There’s lots of pups and chicks and they’re all still dependent on their parents.”
The dad and mom exit fairly a method into the water and forage. Icebergs can block pathways to their meals, making the adults swim farther, burning extra vitality, bringing again much less to the infants. That “unfortunately can dramatically increase mortality rates. And it has happened in the past,” Meijers stated.
That’s unhealthy for that colony, nevertheless it doesn’t quantity to an issue for total penguin populations, Scambos stated.
“The whole ecosystem in the Southern Ocean is very resilient to these events,” he wrote. “It has evolved with these icebergs being a factor for hundreds of thousands of years.”
This iceberg first broke off in 1986 however has been penned in a crowded patch of sea ice for many years till just a few years in the past, Meijers stated.
Calving icebergs are regular, however they’re occurring extra steadily because the local weather warms and extra contemporary water flows into the ocean, Meijers stated.
Learn extra of AP’s local weather protection at http://www.apnews.com/climate-and-environment
Comply with Seth Borenstein on X at @borenbears
