Environment & Energy
Related: About this forumOops! Larsen C Ice Shelf Crack Has Branched; Also Growing Wider By 1 Meter/Day
Scientists keeping close watch on the Larsen C Ice Shelf in Antarctica have noticed something new: The rift, which has been opening across the shelf for some time, now has a sibling. Using a highly-sensitive European Space Agency satellite known as Sentinel-1, scientists have been tracking the progress of a lengthening and widening crack across the floating Larsen C Ice Shelf. Once this crack reaches a certain point exactly when is unclear it could break off one of the largest icebergs on record.
Recently, though, the main fissure has not progressed further across the ice shelf, since it's hung up in an area of softer ice known as a "suture zone," slowing its forward speed. However, while progress of the main rift seems to have slowed, scientists have spotted a "new branch" of the rift heading toward the ice front, where the ice shelf meets the sea.
Link to tweet
According to the scientists, eventually the ice shelf rifts will cause the Larsen C Ice Shelf to suddenly lose more than 10 percent of its area, which will leave the front of the ice shelf at a far more vulnerable, retreated position, where it can be more easily undermined through warming ocean waters and increasing air temperatures. The scientists are using the Sentinel's synthetic aperture radar to discern the rift's behavior, since it is currently winter in Antarctica, making visual confirmation difficult to impossible. They've noticed that even though the length of the rift has stopped increasing, it has continued to widen at more than 1 meter, or 3.2 feet, per day. The new branch of the ice crack may be helping to accelerate this widening trend.
EDIT
http://mashable.com/2017/05/02/second-crack-larsen-c-ice-shelf-largest-iceberg/#PI3leI_w7mqn
Doodley
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(5,719 posts)I can't imagine, with winter freeze-up underway, that there would be open water there. How thick would the rift ice be?