The Pine Island glacier in West Antarctica the major ice flows of the Südkontinents. Alone, his amounts of ice form around ten per cent of the West Antarctic ice sheet – no glaciers in the world, transporting more ice to the sea than he is.

The more precise researchers observe the activities of the 250 kilometres long and on average two kilometres thick ice sheets. That you have formed in the last few years back, is viewed with concern.

Now researchers have discovered again a spectacular demolition of the iceberg – he is more than 200 square kilometers in size. In the past year, we had a break in almost the same place. The former fragment of B-44 and the resulting piece of B-46 see amazingly similar.

“Because the shapes of the icebergs are highly dependent on the local conditions, it is not so unusual to have similar-looking icebergs in 2017 and 2018,” said geoscientist Stef Lhermitte of the Technical University in Delft, the Netherlands.

Both fractures originated in the same Region of the glacier, the last only about five kilometers more land – or eiseinwärts. The European space Agency Esa and ihrUS counterpart, Nasa confirmed the cancellation of the iceberg. The Lhermitte presented the picture of the iceberg was Redwin the best so far existing.

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The formation of cracks in the shelf ice and the resulting creation of new icebergs are natural processes. Warm ocean water is eating away at the glaciers from below, until it comes to a break, suggest experts. According to Lhermitte, the edge of a Glacier, as compared with records of past decades back, since 2015 is particularly strong.

However, an excessive decrease in the Antarctic could have a glacier unpleasant consequences. The entire West Antarctic ice sheet would flow into the ocean, could this have a global sea-level rise of more than three meters, the fear of some researchers.

Lhermitte’s power in a Tweet the next possible breaking point, again a few kilometres further on, in the glacier interior.

The future development depends on whether the Pine Island could recover the glacier system. The Lhermitte presented the image of the Fragment B-46 was created with the help of Esa’s earth observation satellite “Sentinel”. One of the satellites had recorded data to the fragment B-44.

recently, Nasa researchers prior to the Antarctic and photographed an unusual iceberg in the Weddell sea. He fell because of its perfect rectangular shape.

joe/dpa