Atmosphere Journal Entry
Antarctic Ice Shelf is Breaking Up (April 7, 2008)
A huge ice shelf is breaking apart in Antarctica. National Snow and Ice Data Center.
Antarctica's huge Wilkins Ice Shelf is the latest victim of global warming. New satellite pictures show the ice shelf is breaking up.
An enormous iceberg recently broke off the shelf's southwestern edge. The iceberg is 25 miles long and a mile and a half wide. It covers an area seven times larger than New York's island of Manhattan. The massive chunk of ice has been around for 1,500 years.
After the iceberg broke off, the shelf's interior started breaking apart. More than 160 square miles (400 square km) of ice have been lost.
The Wilkins Ice Shelf is part of West Antarctica. It's the side of Antarctica hit the hardest by global warming. The region has warmed by 0.9 degrees Fahrenheit (0.5 degrees Celsius) per decade over the past fifty years. Climate scientists say this is the steepest temperature rise anywhere on the planet.
More than 5,000 square miles (13,000 sq. km) of Antarctica has melted into the sea over the past fifty years and added to rising global sea levels. On average, sea level is rising 0.11 inches (3 millimeters) per year. At that rate, it will climb by 4.6 feet (1.4 meters) by the end of this century.
