Wilkins ice shelf

Cracking up

by Gareth April 22, 2009

With the “pin” to Charcot Island gone, big cracks that first formed in 2008 are are opening up in the Wilkins ice shelf, and a new break up is taking place close to Latady Island. The animation above uses ESA “webcam from space” images captured on April 18 and 21 (the latter has black corners). [...]

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Breakaway

by Gareth April 9, 2009

This somewhat crude(*), but effective animation of the two most recent ESA images of the Wilkins Ice Shelf break up shows clearly that with the “pin” gone, large areas of ice are beginning to move. The most recent image (April 8th) is the smaller, overlaid on one captured on April 5th. Focus on what was [...]

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Gone west

by Gareth April 8, 2009

NASA’s Earth Observatory has just published a pair of beautiful images of the Wilkins Ice Shelf showing the ice bridge before and after collapse. The image above, acquired on April 6th, shows the bergs created by the break up moving towards the west. With the bridge gone, the remnant ice from earlier break ups to [...]

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…Gone

by Gareth April 5, 2009

Since I posted 12 hours ago on the imminent demise of a large chunk of the Wilkins ice shelf, new ESA imagery shows that it has finally collapsed into a shattered mass of icebergs — roughly centre of this image. The BBC has the story, together with comments from David Vaughan of the British Antarctic [...]

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Last straw

by Gareth April 5, 2009

The last bit of the ice “bridge” pinning the Wilkins Ice Shelf in place appears to be on the verge of collapse, according to the European Space Agency. New rifts formed on April 2nd (blue lines above), and have begun to spread rapidly. Worth keeping an eye on the ESA’s “webcam from space” over the [...]

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Hangin’ on #2

by Gareth January 26, 2009

Here’s the latest imagery of the Wilkins Ice Shelf from the European Space Agency’s amazing “webcam from space” page (the ice shelf is the black structure running from top left to bottom right — sea shows as white). This image was captured on Jan 24th, and clearly shows the narrow 2km neck referred to in [...]

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You keep me hangin’ on

by Gareth January 22, 2009

According to Alister Doyle, Reuters’ man in Antarctica (now that’s a job I’d like to try…), what’s left of the Wilkins Ice Shelf is on “the brink of collapse with just a sliver of ice holding it in place“. Earlier this week, Doyle reported on a trip with the British Antarctic Survey to the remnants [...]

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The cracks are showing #2 (polar notes)

by Gareth December 5, 2008

Summer’s arriving on the Wilkins ice shelf, and its disintegration continues. New cracks are threatening to destroy the ice “bridge” that’s been holding the ice shelf pinned between Charcot Island (top left) and the Antarctic peninsula. This picture, captured by the European Space Agency’s ENVISAT satellite on November 26, shows the new cracks (coloured lines) [...]

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Celia of the seals

by Gareth August 13, 2008

It appears that my wish is someone’s command. Last month, blogging on the continuing break-up of the Wilkins ice shelf, I noted a reference to “seal hats” as data gathering devices and expressed a wish to see them. And here they are! Little devices glued to the heads of elephant seals that gather data as [...]

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Melt your heart

by Gareth July 12, 2008

Typical winter weather down here – we’ve gone from snow last weekend to sunny days and sharp frosts, and now howling Norwester and unseasonal, but not atypical warmth (having said that, the radio reports that Kaikoura recorded 21ºC at 1am last night, which is both). Further south, however, strange things are afoot at the Wilkins [...]

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