Space/Science — HabitableZone

Space/Science » in reply to Larsen C ice shelf about to lose %10

Winter is closing in in the Southern hemisphere.

So this probably won't calve til next summer. By that time, the news from the Arctic will be on everyone's mind. We may not get a record breaker like 2012 this year in the North, but even if we don't it will come very close. Already, ice volume is lower than its ever been in the Arctic, and ice extent for the last three years has been pretty low, although not yet a record.

Sea ice in the Southern Ocean is tracking pretty much the same as the 30 year average, but its about one and a quarter million square kilometers less that the average for the same date.

http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/

Click on the Arctic/Antarctic buttons to look at extent data from both poles. The calving of these big shelves is just (please forgive the expression) the tip of the iceberg. Ice is calving off all these shelves on a broad front.

BTW, The Larsen C berg, at about 10,000 km^2, will be about three times the size of the already-calved Larsen B shelf mentioned in your article.

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