Looking to find out what has happened to the Larsen C Ice Shelf? Let’s take a look at how the home to NASA’s rectangular iceberg is getting on this January 2023.
In October 2018, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) revealed bizarre images of what looked like an iceberg perfectly cut in the shape of a rectangle.
For any who missed the news when it emerged over four years ago, you might be curious to know more about the natural phenomenon. Renewed interest has come as the result of a viral Twitter post about the Larsen C Ice Shelf. The tweet, posted on January 14, has over 229,000 likes as of publication.
Let’s take a deep dive into the bizarre ice-forged rectangle in Antarctica.
NASA uncovers rectangular iceberg near Larsen C Ice Shelf
The iceberg was discovered as part of NASA’s Operation IceBridge. A research aircraft was imaging the Antarctic ice when they uncovered the rectangular iceberg, A-68, which is approximately the size of Delaware. Operation IceBridge has been studying the Earth’s ice since around 2009. NASA have been sending out research aircrafts to image the ice, monitoring the Earth’s changing polar regions.
The purpose of this IceBridge flight was to assess changes in the ice height of several glaciers draining into the bays of Larsen A, B and C. But senior support scientist Jeremy Harbeck spotted the rectangular iceberg during the flight, then sharing the bizarre images with the world.
The rectangular A-68 iceberg was calved from the Larsen C Ice Shelf in July 2017.
Where is the Larsen C Ice Shelf?
The Larsen Ice Shelf is a long ice shelf found northwest of the Weddell Sea, part of the Southern (or Antarctic) Ocean. It is found on the eastern side of the Antarctic Peninsula.
This ice shelf is comprised of several shelves on specific embayments, that have been divided up by mappers into separate segments. The segments are known as Larsen A, B, and C. Larsen C is one of the largest ice shelves in all of Antarctica. There are several other shelves further south on Larsen, known as Larsen D, E, F, and G.
Larsen Ice Shelf has been through decades of change
The Larsen Ice Shelf has been a fixture in the public imagination since the 1990s. Attention has been placed on the shelf’s changing coastline and topography, and what that means for the planet, over the past few decades.
In 1995, Larsen A disintegrated. Seven years later, Larsen B collapsed, in a highly-publicized fashion. Larsen B was stable for at least 10,000 years leading up to its collapse. This was a result of warm currents affecting the underside of Larsen B, signalling the effects global warming are having on the polar regions.
Larsen C started to disintegrate mid-2016, with the A-68 iceberg breaking away from the ice shelf the following year.
What happened to the rectangular iceberg A-68?
After slowly drifting northwards, the A-68 iceberg began to break apart, losing its perfectly rectangular shape. It broke off into two main bergs, A-68A and the smaller A-68B, between 2018 and 2019. Parts of A-68A have been broken off over the past few years as the major iceberg has separated into smaller fragments.
On April 16, 2021, the largest fragment of A-68 was down to just three nautical miles in length, so the US National Ice Center discontinued tracking the berg, the BBC reports.
Concerns that Larsen C Ice Shelf is melting and vulnerable to collapse continue to be raised.
In other news, What happened to the rectangular iceberg from Antarctica’s Larsen C Ice Shelf?
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