An ice block twice as big as New York is about to get rid of Antarctica

NASA warned Friday in a statement that the iceberg twice as big as the city of New York would be just around the corner from Antarctica. This is a 1700 square kilometer ice block that is expected to break due to cracks that have appeared in recent years on the Bunt ice floe.

Although scientists do not know the exact moment when the break will occur, they warned that this could affect the rest of the continental shelf as well as the scientific infrastructure that is installed there and with the people.

NASA compared in its advertisement a photograph of the area in question, made from Landsat satellite in January 1986, with another month of January this year, where we can see a crack that runs through west is all the part that should emerge, and has a coastal shape.

When this crack, called Halloween crack, meets another crossing the square from south to north, it is badumed that the territory is detached, transformed into a gigantic iceberg whose direction is unpredictable, as well as the effects it will have on the area. of this region of the Antarctic continent.

According to NASA, this second ditch, which runs from south to north, remained stable for 35 years, but its growth accelerated sharply and continued to expand northward with 4 km per year.

The iceberg that will emerge seems gigantic, but by the standards of the white continent, it's not so much, they badured NASA, though, in any case, "it's important" .

In fact, the agency noted on its website: "This is perhaps the largest broken iceberg on the Brunt ice floe since the observations began, in 1915."

"Scientists are currently studying whether this loss would result in further surface modification and could even become unstable or break," warned the space agency.

Increasing fissures that fracture the Antarctic surface have raised concerns among people working on the platform, especially researchers at Halley Station, British Antarctic Survey.

It is one of the main bases of research on the Earth, the atmosphere and space science. In general, it is active all year, but it has closed twice in recent years due to unpredictable changes in ice.

Information on the EFE agency