Giant Iceberg the size of Delaware breaks off Antarctica

Back in my day... wrote:

beachfront orlando wrote:

Makes the 2002 iceberg look small.

Isn't the 1956 one still bigger?

"The berg was sighted by the Glacier early this week about 150 miles west of Scott Island. The ship reported it was 60 miles wide and 208 miles long- or more than 12,000 square miles, as against Connecticut's 5,009.

The 1927 one (less documented) is also bigger, at 100 miles long, 100 miles wide, and 130 feet high.

The new rift (A68) is about 5800 km^2 (all numbers approximate).

Some prior data:

1956: 31000 km^2

1927: 25000 km^2

2000: 11000 km^2 (B-15)

1964: 10000 km^2 (Amery ice shelf)

2000: 9200 km^2 (A-43)

1986: 9000 km^2 [Ferrigno & Gould, inferred from a yearlong timeline imaging showing greater calving]

1998: 6900 km^2 (A-38)

2017: 5800 km^2 (A-68)

2002: 5500 km^2 (C-19) [probably the most recent hyped one]

1987: 5400 km^2 (B-9, Ross sea)

Anything prior to satellites in susceptible to relative overestimation, due to differences in measurement techniques.

Doctor Laylock J Moleman wrote:

We need to give up South America as lost already. Form a military blockade at the Panama Canal and keep the ravenous penguin packs out.

Wait, penguins can swim. Better defoliate several miles of Panama from coast to coast and mine the thing.

A report in the press announced that since 2011, an estimated 150,000 Adélie penguins living in Antarctica have died after B-9B became grounded near their colony at Cape Denison in Commonwealth Bay.[4] The iceberg effectively blocked the penguins' access to the ocean and their primary source of food; they must now trek 60 kilometres (37 mi) to the sea.[4] According to the Climate Change Research Center at Australia's University of New South Wales, the colony of 160,000 penguins has been reduced to only 10,000.[4] Scientists predict that this colony will be gone in 20 years unless the sea ice breaks up or B-9B is dislodged.[4] However, subsequent release from experts from the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) and elsewhere in the world corrected the over-statement made by the journalists. The missing penguins did not die because of the presence of the iceberg but most probably left to establish new colonies in more suitable places, as the original publication suggests. The official statement from SCAR can be found at

This berg is a clear and present danger to the environment and should be eliminated with salt bombs.

Global Warming

That's a lot of lettuce!! What will I put on my sandwiches the next few weeks?

Swongner wrote:

Kyzer Sozenator wrote:

(sigh) Let me spell this out for all you dummies.

Colligative properties of water for the experiment above will result in ~2.5 molality NaCl (about 4x's the salinity of seawater), giving a 9°F deperession of water's freezing point. NaCl does not precipitate out of water until concentrations about 10X's that of seawater.

Please do us all a favor and shut up about things you all don't understand.

You obviously don't live up in the NE. I put salt on my steps during the winter after a snow or ice storm. The ice melts.

Oh you're from the NE. That explains everything.

Have you considered that dropping chunks of salt onto ice create highly concentrated points of NaCl that far exceed the molality of seawater?

Also, this is completely irrelevant from the discussion. Have any of you morans done the experiment I outlined above? IF NOT YOU HAVE NOTHING TO CONTRIBUTE.