October 25, 2018
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NASA spots a SECOND 'monolith' iceberg
NASA has spotted a second perfectly rectangular iceberg in the Antarctic. The second rectangular berg, known as a 'tabular' iceberg, was spotted off the east coast of the Antarctic Peninsula, near the Larsen C ice shelf and close to the first one. It is part of a large field of bergs NASA experts may have recently broken off the shelf, and say the sharp angles and flat surfaces are evidence the break occurred very recently.
The image was taken during an IceBridge flight an airborne survey of the planet's polar ice that gives a 3D view of the ice that makes up the Arctic and Antarctic, providing vital information on how it changes over time.
'I thought it was pretty interesting; I often see icebergs with relatively straight edges, but I've not really seen one before with two corners at such right angles like this one had,' said IceBridge senior support scientist Jeremy Harbeck.
The rectangular iceberg appeared to be freshly calved from Larsen C, which in July 2017 released the massive A68 iceberg, a chunk of ice about the size of the state of Delaware.
In a different photo (above), Harbeck captured both the edge of the now-famous iceberg, and a slightly less rectangular iceberg. That image also captures A68 in the distance.
'I was actually more interested in capturing the A68 iceberg that we were about to fly over, but I thought this rectangular iceberg was visually interesting and fairly photogenic, so on a lark, I just took a couple photos,' Harbeck said.
The flight originated from Punta Arenas, Chile, as part of a five-week-long IceBridge deployment, which began Oct. 10 and is scheduled to conclude Nov. 18.
The scheme is NASA's longest-running aerial survey of polar ice. During the survey, designed to assess changes in the ice height of several glaciers draining into the Larsen A, B and C embayments, IceBridge senior support scientist Jeremy Harbeck spotted a very sharp-angled, tabular iceberg floating among sea ice just off of the Larsen C ice shelf. The strange, angular berg is known as a tabular iceberg. 'The iceberg's sharp angles and flat surface indicate that it probably recently calved from the ice shelf.'
Extracted from: www.dailymail.co.uk
