{"id":187419,"date":"2024-12-03T10:42:46","date_gmt":"2024-12-03T10:42:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/12\/03\/an-unexpected-ice-collapse-hints-at-worrying-changes-on-the-antarctic-coast\/"},"modified":"2024-12-03T10:42:46","modified_gmt":"2024-12-03T10:42:46","slug":"an-unexpected-ice-collapse-hints-at-worrying-changes-on-the-antarctic-coast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/12\/03\/an-unexpected-ice-collapse-hints-at-worrying-changes-on-the-antarctic-coast\/","title":{"rendered":"An unexpected ice collapse hints at worrying changes on the Antarctic coast"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"text-align:center\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i3.wp.com\/www.sciencenews.org\/112524_df_conger-ice-shelf_inline-left-4?ssl=1\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"An unexpected ice collapse hints at worrying changes on the Antarctic coast\" title=\"An unexpected ice collapse hints at worrying changes on the Antarctic coast\" \/><\/div> \r\n<br><div data-component=\"video-embed\">\n\t\t\t\t\n\n\n\n\n<p>A hot spot is starting to form along the coast of East Antarctica.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>An ice shelf that broke apart seemingly unprovoked a couple of years ago had been steadily weakening for 30 years, largely unnoticed by scientists, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41561-024-01582-3\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">researchers report December 3 in <em>Nature Geoscience<\/em><\/a>. The finding, based on decades of satellite observations, raises concerns about a region of Antarctica long considered stable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe East Antarctic Ice Sheet holds 10 times as much ice\u201d as West Antarctica, says Mathieu Morlighem, a glaciologist at Dartmouth College who was not part of the study. West Antarctica is already <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencenews.org\/article\/melting-eroding-thwaites-glacier\">hemorrhaging ice at an alarming rate<\/a> (<em>SN: 2\/15\/23<\/em>). But if the East Antarctic Ice Sheet also retreats, it could dramatically increase the rate of sea level rise over the next several centuries.<\/p>\n\n\n<aside class=\"sn-conversion rich-text rich-text--with-sidebar\">\n<style><![CDATA[\n.email-conversion {\n  border: 1px solid #ffcccb;\n  color: white;\n  margin-top: 50px;\n  background-image: url(\"\/wp-content\/themes\/sciencenews\/client\/src\/images\/cta-module@2x.jpg\");\n  padding: 20px;\n  clear: both;\n}\n\n]]><\/style>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"rich-text embedded-conversion-content is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container\">\n<style><![CDATA[\n#dynamic-wrapper {\n  border: 1px solid #ffcccb;\n  background-image: url(\"https:\/\/www.sciencenews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/cta_background_aurora.jpg\");\n  background-size: cover;\n  background-position: center center;\n  padding: 20px;\n  clear: both;\n}\n\n#dynamic-conversion {\n  padding: 20px;\n  background:rgba(0,0,0, 0.5);\n  color: white;\n}\n\n#dynamic-conversion h2 {\n  color: white;\n}\n\np.has-text-align-center a {\n  color: white !important;\n  text-decoration: none;\n  font-weight: bold;\n}\n\n]]><\/style>\n\n\n\n<div id=\"dynamic-wrapper\" class=\"wp-block-group\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-constrained wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">\n<div id=\"dynamic-conversion\" class=\"wp-block-group\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\"><strong>Have feedback for Science News?<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">Help us improve by telling us about your experience<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<\/aside>\n\n\n<p>The latest reminder of this concern is East Antarctica\u2019s Conger ice shelf, a former slab of floating glacial ice with an area about 20 times that of Manhattan. In 2022, it suddenly fragmented into icebergs, which then drifted apart over the course of several days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cNobody was thinking it was going to go,\u201d says Catherine Walker, a glaciologist with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts who led the new study. It \u201cwasn\u2019t even melting that rapidly.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"slideshow__container___2inGd\" data-component=\"slideshow\">\n\t\n\n\t<ol class=\"slideshow__slides___BfLMo\">\n\t\t\n<li class=\"slideshow__wrapper___Aebb- item-1\" role=\"listitem\">\n\t<figure class=\"slideshow__figure___DHfIZ\">\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\t<figcaption class=\"slideshow__gallery-caption___jcoF1\">\n\t\t\t\t<span class=\"caption\">In a satellite image taken on January 9, 2022, East Antarctica\u2019s Conger ice shelf floats fully intact (seen at the bottom of the image, stretching from the coast at left to an island at right).<\/span>\t\t\t\t<span class=\"credit\">Lauren Dauphin, NASA Earth Observatory<\/span>\t\t\t<\/figcaption>\n\n\t\t\t<\/figure>\n\n<\/li>\n<li class=\"slideshow__wrapper___Aebb- item-2\" role=\"listitem\">\n\t<figure class=\"slideshow__figure___DHfIZ\">\n\t\t<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"559\" height=\"383\" class=\"attachment-medium size-medium\" alt=\"The Conger ice shelf is seen starting to break apart from space, pictured as a fracturing white mass on the ocean\" data-attachment-id=\"3146875\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sciencenews.org\/112524_df_conger-ice-shelf_inline-right\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.sciencenews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/112524_df_conger-ice-shelf_inline-right.jpg?fit=680%2C466&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"680,466\" data-comments-opened=\"0\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"112524_df_conger-ice-shelf_inline-right\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"&lt;p&gt; A satellite image taken 11 weeks later, on March 23, 2022, shows what became of the ice shelf after it rapidly collapsed just a couple of weeks prior. &lt;\/p&gt;&#10;\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.sciencenews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/112524_df_conger-ice-shelf_inline-right.jpg?fit=559%2C383&amp;ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.sciencenews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/112524_df_conger-ice-shelf_inline-right.jpg?fit=657%2C450&amp;ssl=1\" role=\"button\"\/>\n\t\t\n\t\t\t<figcaption class=\"slideshow__gallery-caption___jcoF1\">\n\t\t\t\t<span class=\"caption\"> A satellite image taken 11 weeks later, on March 23, 2022, shows what became of the ice shelf after it rapidly collapsed just a couple of weeks prior. <\/span>\t\t\t\t<span class=\"credit\">Lauren Dauphin, NASA Earth Observatory<\/span>\t\t\t<\/figcaption>\n\n\t\t\t<\/figure>\n\n<\/li>\t<\/ol>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>Before disintegrating, the Conger ice shelf had probably existed for thousands of years. It was formed by several neighboring glaciers that oozed off the coastline and floated on the ocean. It was only by chance that Walker noticed its collapse in 2022.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>While perusing satellite images to examine another nearby ice shelf, she noticed that the 1,200-square-kilometer Conger ice shelf was present in a photo taken March 10 of that year\u2014 but missing in another one taken six days later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So began a two-year effort to understand what destroyed it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Polar meteorologist Jonathan Wille, along with Walker and 50 other scientists, reported an important clue earlier this year: A powerful storm <a href=\"https:\/\/journals.ametsoc.org\/view\/journals\/clim\/37\/3\/JCLI-D-23-0176.1.xml\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">passed along the coast during that time<\/a>, tilting the sea surface up and down a fraction of a degree. As the ice shelf flexed, it broke along existing cracks. Powerful winds then pried the fragments apart.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWe have every reason to think that [these storms] will become more intense in the future\u201d as Earth warms, says Wille, of the Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science, ETH, in Zurich, Switzerland. Those stronger storms could <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencenews.org\/article\/ipcc-how-climate-change-already-altering-oceans-ice-future\">damage the protective ice shelves<\/a> that fringe Antarctica\u2019s coastline (<em>SN: 9\/25\/19<\/em>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But for the Conger ice shelf, the story is more complicated. The new study shows it was already in bad shape when the storm hit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Some famous ice shelf disintegrations were preceded by massive melting on the upper surface in warm temperatures. But Conger was in an area with generally cold air, and melting on its underside was driven by seawater. Looking through archival satellite measurements, Walker and collaborators found that the floating shelf had gradually thinned, from a thickness of about 200 meters in 1994 to 130 meters in 2021. Satellite radar measurements suggest that cracks permeated its thin, brittle ice \u2014 allowing salty ocean water to seep in and further weaken it.<\/p>\n\n\n<aside class=\"sn-conversion rich-text rich-text--with-sidebar\">\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center wp-elements-27c40654034fbeecef6418d6adfe0794\" style=\"color:gray; margin-bottom:0px; font-size:.9rem;\">Sponsor Message<\/p>\n<!-- Tag ID: sciencenews-org_leaderboard_incontent -->\n\n<\/aside>\n\n\n<p>The Conger ice shelf had long been stabilized because it pressed against an island 50 kilometers off the coast. But as the ice shelf thinned, it became too weak to withstand those compressive forces. The island became \u201ca slow-motion rock coming through a windshield,\u201d Walker says. Cracks spiderwebbed out from the ice shelf\u2019s point of contact with the island, the new study reports. Then, on March 7, 2022, it broke free of the island, leaving it unsupported in the face of the approaching storm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Conger\u2019s collapse won\u2019t noticeably impact sea level, because the glaciers it had stabilized are small. But the fact that it happened in this supposedly stable part of Antarctica \u201cworries me,\u201d Morlighem says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The coastal waters in this area have historically been quite cold, but small changes began around 2010. Ocean currents shifted, allowing water that was 0.6 degrees Celsius warmer than before <a href=\"https:\/\/agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/full\/10.1029\/2023JC019882\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">to intrude toward the coastline<\/a>, researchers reported last year. This may have hastened the Conger ice shelf\u2019s demise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It could also eventually destabilize a massive glacier just 130 kilometers to Conger\u2019s west: The Denman Glacier holds enough ice to raise global sea levels by 1.5 meters if all of it slid into the ocean. It alone contains the equivalent of nearly half the ice in West Antarctica. As Denman flows off the coastline, it grinds between a floating ice shelf on one side, and an island on the other, slowing its advance into the ocean. But the ice that connects it to those stabilizing structures <a href=\"https:\/\/tc.copernicus.org\/articles\/17\/157\/2023\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">is slowly thinning and weakening<\/a>. It could eventually break free and speed up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThis sector of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet has been very stable,\u201d Morlighem says. Some computer simulations predicted that East Antarctica <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41586-022-04946-0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">might even gain some mass<\/a> over the next century. But if Denman and its neighbors destabilize, \u201cthen that completely changes the picture.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n\t\t\t<\/div>\r\n<br>\r\n<br><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencenews.org\/article\/unexpected-ice-collapse-antarctic-coast\">Source link <\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A hot spot is starting to form along the coast of East Antarctica. An ice shelf that broke apart seemingly unprovoked a couple of years ago had been steadily weakening for 30 years, largely unnoticed by scientists, researchers report December 3 in Nature Geoscience. The finding, based on decades of satellite observations, raises concerns about [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":187420,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.sciencenews.org\/112524_df_conger-ice-shelf_inline-left-4","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[606],"tags":[17144,22155,3045,4161,7062,4354,4568],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187419"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=187419"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187419\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":187421,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187419\/revisions\/187421"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/187420"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=187419"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=187419"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=187419"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}