A massive iceberg more than the size of Cebu island in the Visayas is poised to break off from Antarctica in months after a tremendous fracture in one of the continent’s largest ice shelves developed drastically in December, British researchers have said.
Cebu island has a total land area of 4,933-square-km while the Larsen C Ice Shelf has a size of 5000-square-km, the most northern real ice sheet in Antarctica and is holding tight to the continent by a string only 20 km long.
According to a UK-based Project MIDAS who spent years surveying and monitoring the ice shelf. They said that during the second half of December 2016, the crack all of a sudden expanded more than 18 km and if it keeps on developing at the present rate, the ice shelf could fall and collapse, shaping one of the biggest chunks of ice ever recorded.
In the event that the segment of Larsen C splits away, it will expel around 10 percent of the ice shelf area and leave the rest vulnerable to future separation.
“The event, in a general sense will change the area of the Antarctic Peninsula,” researchers said.
Altogether since 2001, the break has developed around 80 km and extended to more than 300 meters.
It is the third section of the colossal Larsen Ice Shelf to face crumbling in the most recent couple of decades. The primary segment, known as Larsen A, collapse in January 1995, and Larsen B separated in mid 2002, researchers added. – JCE.
