ANTARCTICA — NASA satellite images show two cracks running across the Antarctic Brunt Ice Shelf which could break off into a 1,700 kilometer-iceberg.
Images taken by NASA show a northward expanding crevice, named Chasm 1 by the British Antarctic Survey, stretching across the Antarctic Brunt Ice Shelf and a smaller crevice called Halloween crack, inching closer to the edge of the ice shelf.
The two cracks are just 4 kilometers or 2.5 miles from each other.
When these two rifts meet, an iceberg twice the size of New York City will break off of the shelf. NASA predicts the resulting mass of the iceberg could cover 1,700 kilometers or 660 square miles. This would make it the largest iceberg to break away from the Brunt Ice Shelf in over a century.
According to the Natural Environment Research Council, this phenomenon is called iceberg calving. Calving occurs when large portions of ice break off from glaciers or the margins of ice shelves.
Data from the Natural Environment Research Council show that these shifts have forced British researchers working at the Halley Research Station to relocate. There have been six Halley stations built so far.
This iceberg is, in fact, next-level ginormous but NASA says it probably doesn't even reach the top 20 biggest icebergs in history. Can you imagine the size of those?