Community | July 14, 2009 | 17 comments

Arctic glacier to lose Manhattan-sized 'tongue'

source: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17465-arctic-glacier-to-lose-manhattansized-tongue.html

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pjacobs51
The biggest glacier in the Arctic is on the verge of losing a chunk of ice the size of Manhattan. A group of scientists and climate change activists who are closely monitoring the Petermann glacier's ice tongue believe the rapid flow of ice is in part due to warm ocean currents moving up along the coast of Greenland, fuelled by global warming.

During the summer of last year, Jason Box of Ohio State University in Columbus noticed a huge crack in the glacier's floating ice tongue, which acts as a conveyor belt, pushing the glacier's ice through a fjord and out to sea. The crack extended almost completely from one side of the fjord to the other, 16 kilometres away.

This prompted Box and colleagues to return this year on the Arctic Sunrise, a Greenpeace vessel. The researchers are equipped with an arsenal of cameras and sensors, which they have been setting up on surrounding cliffs as well as on the ice itself.

Break imminent!

Stitched together, the pictures they are taking will provide a blow-by-blow animation of the event. "We're looking on a minute by minute basis at what it's doing, how it's moving in relation to the rest of the glacier, and looking for that critical point where it fractures and breaks off," says Alun Hubbard, a glaciologist at the University Of Wales, UK.

The team believes this will happen within weeks. Only yesterday, a 3-square-kilometre chunk broke away. There are now more than 10 cracks in the ice, some 500 metres wide. The researchers expect the ice tongue to break up within the coming weeks.

When this happens, an island of ice the size of Manhattan, spanning 100 km2 holding 5 billion tonnes of ice, will break free and drift out to sea.

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17 comments // Arctic glacier to lose Manhattan-sized 'tongue'

  • bailey78
    • 0
      bailey78  

    • yep ice melts thats what It does. It's no big deal It has been happening sence the begaining of time . just because It's happening in our life time does not mean the world is comeing to an end any sooner. just get ready to move inland if you live on the coast like i do. hell can't wait to have a beach house. not that I'm going to live to see it but I can hope right. you folks need to quit listening to people that are trying to sell you a load of Crap.

    • 2 years ago
  • s0uthc0ast
    • 0
      s0uthc0ast  

    • Naturally, the fairy tale of global warmig is front and center. What is pushing this tongue of ice, mmm, more ice behind the new chunk? It is after all summer in the northern hemisphere, soooooo, melting ice is news?

      That's a lot of fresh water which could be used for irrgation somewhere in the world. I know the Aral sea could use some water.

    • 2 years ago
  • ras_menelik
    • 0
      ras_menelik  
    • Image

    • ice ship...Pykrete ship.

      Comparative Properties of Materials Mechanical properties

      Ice Concrete Pykrete
      Crushing strength 500 2,500 1,100
      Tensile 160 250 700
      Density 0.91 2.5 0.98

      if a rock the size of NY city fel in the Mississippi all would think the world is ending after all the river can't flow no more,well all this fresh water(it will melt in a few weeks after detachment)will interrupt the gulf-stream and without that well.............use your imagination

    • 2 years ago
  • Sumbodyswatchin
  • Gravity_Man
    • 0
      Gravity_Man  

    • I object! Why? Because I have to. By the time you dragged an ice chunk THE SIZE OF MANHATTAN to the equator you wouldn't be dragging anything but an empty rope, and then everybody on Current would be laughing at ya for ages. Let the sun do it always worked before. The water cycle, remember that? It don't need no nuclear. (Tremors, 2009)

    • 2 years ago
  • JK47
  • royulery
    • 0
      royulery  

    • a number of sci fi stories have been written about moving glaciers to arid areas. the u.s. planned a giant aircraft carrier from an iceburg during ww2, a really massive one. i read long ago that the transport of an iceberg through ocean currents wasn't the big problem, the cold fresh water melting from it would destroy the eco-system for miles around it.

      whatever happened to that rhode island sized berg that broke off the antartic? is it still floating around?

    • 2 years ago
  • JK47
    • 0
      JK47  

    • Another thing I always wondered is why are we still storing trash on our planet??? Why don't we send it to Pluto or something?

    • 2 years ago
  • theultimateend
    • 0
      theultimateend  
    • JK47:

      Because a relatively tiny square of land in the US could house all the trash the US would produce for a thousand years without an issue.

      People drastically exaggerate our trash problem. It's not that we have too much trash it is that too many people litter.

    • 2 years ago
  • JK47
    • 0
      JK47  

    • I say we have to break it up for transport.... that could be fun. Bring in the demo team. Then keep it cold in freighters.

    • 2 years ago
  • JK47
    • 0
      JK47  

    • I agree... very creative. We need to be able to adapt if our planet is changing. Taking glaciers to people in need of fresh water is a good idea. Whiners go home.

    • 2 years ago
  • Stever_B
    • 0
      Stever_B  

    • Kenny -- that's actually the best idea I've heard on this. It's CERTAINLY better than the whining, sky-is-falling, stuff we get accompanying a story like this.

      "Oooo, the glacier's breaking!! The glacier's breaking!!!". Yeah? Well why don't we tow it somewhere that needs fresh water? Logistics? Who knows, but it seems more constructive than the whining.

    • 2 years ago
  • kennymotown
  • GodsnLiberals
  • cztheday
    • 0
      cztheday  

    • Kenny,

      A Manhattan-sized rope? We could use it out my dirction right here in the American West (though the inland part of the trip might be a little TOO interesting...)

    • 2 years ago
  • kennymotown
    • 0
      kennymotown  

    • Why is it always a chunk as big as Manhattan? Why not the size of Toronto or as big as Texas. Somebody needs to throw a rope around that puppy and take it to a drought stricken area of the world.

    • 2 years ago
  • GodsnLiberals
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