A-68 Beginning To Fragment SSE Of South Georgia

[hatrack]

The giant iceberg that's been drifting through the South Atlantic looks to have experienced a major break-up. Tuesday's latest satellite imagery reveals major fissures in the tabular berg known as A68a, with huge blocks of ice starting to separate and move away from each other.

A68a, which calved from Antarctica in 2017, has been floating off the coast of South Georgia island. Experts have been watching to see if it might ground in shallow water. Were that to happen - and parts of the berg still could - it might cause problems for the British Overseas Territory's penguins and seals as they go about foraging for fish and krill.

The image at the top of this page comes from the EU's Sentinel-1 radar spacecraft. It was acquired at 07:17 GMT on Tuesday. Although cracks were very pronounced on Monday, they hadn't by that stage cut right through A68a.

"Nearly three-and-a-half years since it calved away from Larsen C Ice Shelf, Iceberg A68a - the fourth largest on record - is finally beginning to disintegrate," observed Adrian Luckman from Swansea University, UK.

EDIT

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-55413969