Photo: @aari_official/Telegram

The world’s largest iceberg is about to disappear

Iceberg A23a, once the world’s largest, has accelerated its fragmentation process and could disappear completely in the coming weeks.

After breaking off from Antarctica 40 years ago, it drifted northward for decades, and at the beginning of this year measured about 3,300 square kilometers, roughly the same size as the Spanish island of Mallorca. By last August, its size had shrunk to less than half.

The mega-iceberg’s transition to the South Atlantic has alerted small ships sailing in the area. In recent weeks, chunks of up to 400 square kilometers have left the enormous mass of ice and could cause significant damage to vessels. Around March, it reached shallow waters near South Georgia. Threatening large populations of penguins and seals that feed their young in the area.

Iceberg calving is part of a natural process, but the scientific community warns that the rate at which they occur has increased in recent years due to climate change induced by human activity.

After breaking off from Antarctica in 1986, the A23a was stuck for more than 30 years in the Weddell Sea. But in 2020 it began floating toward the South Atlantic through the so-called “iceberg alley,” carried by the Antarctic Circumpolar Current.

“I would say it’s in the midst of extinction… it’s basically rotting from below. The water is too warm for it to sustain itself. It’s constantly melting,” physical oceanographer Andrew Meijers of the British Atlantic Survey told AFP. Adding that “this will continue in the coming weeks, and within a few weeks it won’t really be identifiable.”

With information from Cubadebate

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