Large ice shelf thought to be stable in East Antarctica collapses

A massive ice shelf in eastern Antarctica collapsed, scientists said on Friday, marking the first time an ice shelf has done so in the region.

The 460-square mile wide ice shelf, which was roughly the size of New York City and helped keep the Conger and Glenzer glaciers from warmer water, collapsed between March 14 and March 16, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute ice scientist Catherine Walker told The Associated Press.

University of Minnesota ice scientist Peter Neff said the collapse was worrying because eastern Antarctica holds five times more ice than western Antarctica, and if the whole region were to melt, it could raise sea levels across the globe more than 160 feet, according to the AP.

Scientists had long thought that the area had not been impacted heavily by climate change and was stable, according to the wire service, but Neff said the collapse of the ice shelf brought that belief into question.

The Glenzer-Conger ice shelf has been shrinking since the 1970s, Neff noted. Walker added that it rapidly began losing ice in 2020, according to the AP.

“The Glenzer-Conger ice shelf presumably had been there for thousands of years, and it’s not ever going to be there again,” Neff told the wire service.

Antarctica hit historic records last week when monitoring stations in the region logged extremely high temperatures.

The Concordia station recorded its highest temperature yet, at 10.04 degrees Fahrenheit, while a station in Vostok recorded just over zero degrees, which extreme weather tracker Maximiliano Herrera said beat a monthly record by nearly 60 degrees.

The Washington Post reported last week that the eastern Antarctica ice sheet was wavering between 50 and 90 degrees warmer than usual.

On the western side of the continent, concerns have been raised about the Thwaites Glacier, nicknamed the “doomsday glacier” for its size, comparable to the state of Florida. Scientists began a mission this year to investigate the glacier, which is said to be shedding 50 billion tons of ice into the water every year.