The largest iceberg in the world seems to have failed off the coast of an isolated house on the British island to millions of penguins and seals – potentially threatening local fauna, but also offering an opportunity for research on such rare “megabergs”.
Known as A23A, the massive ice slab – roughly the size of the Rhode Island and weighing near a tons Billion – was first heading for southern Georgia months ago, arousing concerns that it could collide with the island and disturb the balance of local fauna.
The British Antarctic Survey (Bas) said on Tuesday that the iceberg apparently hit the continental plateau surrounding southern Georgia, remaining trapped about 73 kilometers from the island itself.
The question of whether the A23A will be stuck for an extended period – and what impact it could have on local fauna – is still in the air.
“It will be interesting to see what will happen now,” an oceanographer with bottom on Tuesday.
The Sub-Anarctic Island of South Georgia is a British territory abroad which is north of Antarctica and about 1,850 kilometers in the east of South America. It supports a tiny non -permanent population of scientists and researchers, but is better known for its abundance of fauna, including five million seals on four different species and 65 million birds on 30 different species. Among them are the wandering albatross, the largest flying bird in the world and several types of penguins.
One of the concerns among researchers is that the iceberg could block the fauna of their normal tracks to food sites, forcing them to travel longer distances and bring less food to their young people.
But Meijers noted that the icebergs store significant micronutrients that are released when they melt, and can also arouse nutrients installed in deep water, which has potentially benefited the local ecosystem.
If this “imposing wall” of ice stimulates the productivity of the oceans, it could “stimulate populations of local predators such as seals and penguins,” he said.
40 -year -old
Running is the last development of the 40 -year -old dramatic life of this ice giant.
A23A interrupted From the Antarctic Ice platform in 1986, but was stuck on the seabed in the Weddell Sea for the next three decades.
After having freed himself in 2020 and rolling the ocean currents to the north after the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula, A23A struck another problem: an oceanic vortex called a column of Taylor, which trapped it by turning in place for months.
Since you get out of the vortex, A23A has stimulated slowly to southern Georgia.
The government of southern Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands have declared in a declaration In January, he “closely monitored” the progress of the A23A and that, although expedition and fishing could be affected, effects on fauna are likely to be localized and transient “.
Satellite imagery showed that the iceberg approached the continental plateau at the end of February, before it seems to be freezing when it has failed, without any major movement visible since March 1.
What could happen
Donavan Tremblay, a specialist in Canada Coast Guard ice cream, told CBC News that he was “very possible” A23A could start moving again because he is more exposed to storms near the island that could tremble or break it.
But “he could also stay there for a while,” he said.
Although the icebergs of this size are relatively rare, it is not the first time that a Megaberg has threatened southern Georgia. In 2020, an iceberg called A68A – previously the largest and the sixth iceberg recorded of all time – separated near the island after affecting the shelf.
A 2022 study found that the A68A released 152 gigatons of freshwater and nutrients in the ocean near the South Georgia. This changed the concentration of salt enough surface water for the effect to persist for more than two months after the foul of the iceberg, according to a separate 2023 Study.
Scientists are still digging in the impact that has had on the local ecosystem – including on whales, seals and plankton levels – and A23A helps.
Meijers’ objective has highlighted is the way in which the release of nutrients could help generate phytoplankton flowers and potentially increase the ocean capacity to capture more atmosphere carbon dioxide.
Other scientists want to know what happened under A23A, which would have drawn up huge scars in the seabed and potentially triggered underwater landslides, explains Alex Normandeau, scientific researcher at the Geological Survey of Canada.
“What are the consequences on marine geology?” He asked. “Because it affects the habitats that are there, where the iceberg is anchored, but it also affects the sedimentary suspension and the underwater processes.”
The icebergs separating from the antarctic and derivative glacial caps are regularly part of the antarctic ice cycle, but Meijers says that the data has shown that ice platforms have lost more mass in the past 20 years – a development of scientists with climate change.
“These are pressing and active areas of research at low and elsewhere,” he said.
