Category: Glaciology
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Ice sheet ‘retreat’ vs ‘collapse’: what is the difference and why does it matter?
The ice sheets over Antarctica and Greenland are going to ‘collapse’, we have been told by scientists. What does it mean for an ice sheet to ‘collapse’, though? Is it not just drammatic language made for headlines? There is, however, a difference. To learn the difference, we need to study past ice sheet retreat preserved…
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Brunt Ice Shelf isn’t collapsing, but the formation of the A81 iceberg is still important
In late 2015 a huge crack was observed in the Brunt Ice Shelf of western Antarctica. The crack gained fame when it drove the British Antarctic Survey to move their entire research base 23 kilometres inland. On 22nd January 2023 this crack broke through the last few kilometres of ice to snap off a huge…
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Why the disappearance of ice from West Antarctica is a big problem for our future.
If you have read an article or listened to someone talk about West Antarctica recently, it was probably about how the ice is all going to vanish overnight. Names such as the ‘doomsday glacier’ are mixed with words like ‘imminent collapse’ and others meant to inspire a fear of catastrophe. Yet, even in a warming…
Rivers of Ice 