Post date: Jul 12, 2013 7:26:17 PM
Antarctica (Next Media) - A massive crack along Antarctica's longest and fastest flowing glacier has created an iceberg roughly eight times the size of New York’s Manhattan Island, according to the BBC.
The crack opened across the full 30 km width of the Pine Island Glacier in west Antarctica.
It was first spotted by a 2011 NASA airborned expedition.Imagery received by the German TerraSAR-X satellite on Monday confirmed that the break had spread across the entire width of the ice shelf.
The new iceberg calved into the Southern Ocean measures about 720 sq km in area -- or eight times the size of New York’s Manhattan Island.
Pine Island Glacier drains roughly 10% of the West Antarctic ice sheet, bringing about as much water to the ocean as Europe's Rhine river.
SOURCES: BBC
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23249909