Enormous ice shelf snaps off in Arctic

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An ancient ice shelf has cracked off northern Ellesmere Island, creating an enormous, 66- square-kilometre ice island and leaving a trail of icy blocks in its wake.
...
It broke up 16 months ago, but no one was present to see it. The scientists say they are only now releasing details after piecing together what occurred using seismic monitors and Canadian and U.S. satellites.
....
"If you were standing right on the edge of the shelf, there'd have been this huge 15-kilometre crack as far as you could see in both directions," said Mr. Copland.

"And then the ice drifted off." Within an hour, the giant ice island was a kilometre offshore. It travelled west about 50 kilometres over the next few weeks, and then moved east before freezing into the sea ice about 15 kilometres offshore.

The ice island is about 37 metres thick and measures roughly 15 kilometres by five kilometres. That's the size of a small city, or larger than 11,000 football fields.

The island is now stuck in the winter ice, but the researchers believe it is just a matter of time before it is freed and floats away. They say the ice island could become a potential hazard to navigation and oil and gas extraction if it sails south towards the Beaufort Sea.

Also for Reference:
en.wikipedia.org...




Wasn't this how the Movie "The Day After Tomorrow begins?"


[edit on 12/28/2006 by a1ex]

^ Scary, very, very scary. After watching An Inconvient Truth this would probably be the biggest concern for planet earth at this moment. The last thing we need are ice shelf snapping off the Artic. Now what we really dont need is the same thing happening to Greenland. If so, then the UK can wave a slow good bye as they undergo another ice age.

this will be worth watching indeed!!! They did a cbc broadcast live from the northwest passage last summer and at the time it was 70 degrees farenheit and no ice in the water.It's a matter of time before the waters around the globe start to rise.....

whoa found a site from 2004 pictures around ellesmere island:

www.stevenwebster.com...




2004! I live in Canada and that far up north I would of guessed that more ice would be present....

Also found Videos:
www.stevenwebster.com...
www.stevenwebster.com...
www.stevenwebster.com...
www.stevenwebster.com...

[edit on 12/29/2006 by a1ex]

Survey....

Who thinks all the ice in the arctic has always been there?

Who thinks the ice mass grows, calves, re-grows, calves, re-grows, etc?



FYI...This planet has been in a state of CHANGE throughout it's existence.

To think it would become static to accomodate us is arrogant.

I agree vanity has made us Blind!

Nearsighted at least.

thats going to fit in nicley for those suposingly under funded canadian gas and oil feilds(witch is gonna be interesting to watch because theres a big economy throw around with saddam haing from a tie like investors didnt know what comodities were under there its just a expensive prank i hear its nearly like enron at india up there) what were half build because near secound world russia work like dogs for heated housing they reckon they
were plaining on hellping london out and you yanks with ur real expensive mother pipe form canada bp or exxon build witch is falling apart i read sum were there gonna send sum tankers straight thought the big ice cube

Carry on like this much longer and Ellesmere Island will be as warm and ice free as it was 4,000 years ago

This may interest some:

Two new series of radiocarbon age determinations form the basis for this paper. The first series shows that both the outer east coast of Ellesmere Island (north to latitude 78 degrees 36 prime) and much of Makinson Inlet were free of glacier ice prior to 9000 radiocarbon years ago (dates uncorrected for the apparent age of sea water). However, on the basis of the available data the head of the north arm of Makinson Inlet, north of the present site of Split Lake, was not invaded by a marine fauna until about 2000 years later, presumably because of the persistence of glacier ice in this trough. The second series of age determinations relates to fluctuations of outlet glaciers during Holocene time. Dates of 5180+-260 years (GSC-2909) and 2590+-150 years (GSC-3191) for the bottom and top, respectively, of a massive peat deposit bracket a period during which outlet glacier 7A-45, north of the head of Makinson Inlet, was smaller than it is at present. Data from several sites suggest an advance of glaciers about 1000 years ago, and a second advance, during the last 100 years or so, is recorded at the margins of a number of glaciers draining the ice caps in central and southeastern Ellesmere Island.

see here


But ssshhhh - don't tell the catastrophists

Just got through reading State of Fear. Has anybody checked for explosive residue on the fracture line. Could have been caused by eco-terrorists. That was size of the piece that was to be knocked off in Antarctica in the story.

Hey it's possible....

Essan - you dont have to be a catastrophists to acknowledge that changes in our environment would be catastrophic to a lot of people. Regardless of the cause, even if its the natural cycle of things, doesnt change the fact that many places aren't equipped to deal with even mild environmental fluctuations.

This point comes up a lot when people try to debate the causes of global warming. Humans may not be the cause ,but we better gear ourselves up for some major changes, because the earth isnt going to wait for us to be prepared.

[edit on 30-12-2006 by xEphon]

Originally posted by xEphon

This point comes up a lot when people try to debate the causes of global warming. Humans may not be the cause ,but we better gear ourselves up for some major changes, because the earth isnt going to wait for us to be prepared.

[edit on 30-12-2006 by xEphon]

Excellent point which so often is overlooked. Regardless of cause it is happening and the agenda should be "what do we do" instead of sitting there banging each others head over what is causing it. I´m no scientist in this regard, only an observer but non the less that is the impression i´m getting after watching too many threads/discussions/websites/reports featuring people in the know.

Originally posted by xEphon
Essan - you dont have to be a catastrophists to acknowledge that changes in our environment would be catastrophic to a lot of people. Regardless of the cause, even if its the natural cycle of things, doesnt change the fact that many places aren't equipped to deal with even mild environmental fluctuations.

This point comes up a lot when people try to debate the causes of global warming. Humans may not be the cause ,but we better gear ourselves up for some major changes, because the earth isnt going to wait for us to be prepared.

[edit on 30-12-2006 by xEphon]

xEphon
I totally agree, prepare for it, wait for it then we worry about pointing fingers

if i hear a large "splash" noise, i will worry

Copland and colleagues concluded that
the disintegration was caused by several factors,
mostly related to global warming...

Oil and gas exploration and drilling can trigger earthquakes.
So it hardly seems a leap to conclude that
'oil and gas exploration and drilling'
can trigger glacier and iceberg calving too.

...Besides global warming, there's "significant oil and gas development" in
the Arctic. Looks like a double whammy to me.

"...We are crossing climate thresholds, and these may signal the onset of
accelerated change ahead," Vincent said Thursday.

"What surprised us was how quickly it happened," Copland said. "It's pretty alarming. Even 10 years ago scientists assumed that when global warming changes occur that it would happen gradually so that perhaps we expected these ice shelves just to melt away quite slowly, but the big surprise is that for one they are going, but secondly that when they do go, they just go suddenly, it's all at once, in a span of an hour."

"There's significant oil and gas development in this region as well..."

One of the most significant discoveries of 2006.

But not nearly as sexy as "terrorists" and the threat of nuclear war.
Which imo, are distractions manufactured and manipulated to camouflage
the real crises facing our planet.

Humans Under Threat will react worse than nature under threat!

......but in the end Nature will end up the winner!

I noticed that wikipedia has not been updated with recent findings:

en.wikipedia.org...

Are there any wikipedia admins here on ATS?