Uncertainty about the melting of a giant iceberg in the South Atlantic

Antarctic ice cap collapsed warming faster than the rest of the planet, This has caused the melting of snow and ice caps, as well as the retreat of glaciers, particularly around the Weddell Sea. As glaciers retreat, pieces of ice break up and drift until they either explode or hit the shore.

In 2020, currents carried the A68 iceberg, which broke off from Antarctica in 2017 and has an area of ​​nearly 6,000 square kilometers, to the coast of the South Georgia Islands.. At the time, scientists feared that you might bump into an island that is considered a breeding ground for sea lions and penguins. It finally ended up splitting and disintegrating into pieces.

A68 did not fly, but investigators now who followed all the stages of their journey, They question the effect of solubility on the food chain. Although this giant iceberg has long melted off the island of South Georgia, Released more than 150,000 million tons of fresh water, which can change the fragile ecosystem, According to a recently published study.

The study sheds particular light on this This volume of water, which drains into the sea where seals, birds and whales feed, could have affected the “properties of the water and plankton”.

More importantly, this effect has been studied since then A68 “taken a classic path”, pointed out Anne Brackman Fulgman CPOM researcher and PhD student at the School of Earth and Environment at the University of Leeds. “We hope to learn more about icebergs that follow the same path and how they affect the polar oceans,” he added.

Why do these phenomena occur?

Scientists explain it Although the loss of polar ice in the form of icebergs that melt later is a natural process, global warming has accelerated it. That is why, five years ago, this glacier managed to break away from the Larsen C ice shelf, east of the Antarctic Peninsula.

This huge block of ice It was twice the size of Luxembourg, and it was the sixth largest ever discoveryAccording to a study by the journal Remote Sensing of Environment.

Two years later, it left the cold waters of the Weddell Sea to begin its journey north, entering the Atlantic Ocean, where it finally ended melting in the southern spring of 2021.

A study finds that average sea level has risen about 9 inches since 1880, and about a quarter of that rise is caused by melting ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica, along with terrestrial glaciers elsewhere. temper nature.

That study, conducted by 84 scientists from 15 countries, concluded that More ambitious national targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and curb climate change that have been set recently are not enough to prevent sea level rise. In fact, melting glaciers and ice sheets will raise sea levels twice as much as if countries fulfilled their previous promises under the Paris Agreement.

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