After five years of being the world’s largest free-floating object, the B-15A iceberg has finally broken up off Antarctica’s Cape Adare.

ESA’s Envisat satellite’s Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar (ASAR) is sensitive to ice, and has been tracking the movement of the drifting ice object since the beginning of this year. Its latest imagery reveals the bottle-shaped iceberg split into nine knife-shaped icebergs and a myriad of smaller pieces on 27-28 October, the largest being formed by fractures along the long axis of the original single iceberg.

Measuring — until last week — around 115 kilometres in length with an area exceeding 2500 square kilometres, the iceberg had apparently run aground off Cape Adare, the northernmost corner of the Victoria Land Coast. This stranding appears to have led to flexing and straining which resulted in the break-up.

“The long knife-shaped pieces suggest the iceberg has split along existing lines of weakness within the iceberg,” says Mark Drinkwater of ESA’s Ocean and Ice Unit. “These would have been pre-existing crevasses in the ice shelf.”

These new icebergs, named by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) National Ice Center, will retain their parent’s title: the three largest island-sized pieces have been called B-15M, B-15N and B-15P.

B-15A was the largest remaining section of the even larger B-15 iceberg that calved from the nearby Ross Ice Shelf in March 2000 before breaking up into smaller sections.

Since then its B-15A section drifted into McMurdo Sound, where its presence blocked ocean currents and led to a build-up of sea ice that decimated local penguin colonies, deprived of open waters for feeding. During the spring of this year prevailing currents took B-15A slowly past the Drygalski ice tongue. A full-fledged collision failed to take place, but a glancing blow broke the end off Drygalski in mid-April.

The iceberg sailed on to have a less-destructive close encounter with the Aviator Glacier ice tongue at Lady Newnes Bay before becoming stranded off Cape Adare in mid-October.

Radar monitoring of Antarctic ice

ASAR is extremely useful for tracking changes in polar ice. ASAR can peer through the thickest polar clouds and work through local day and night. And because it measures surface texture, the instrument is also extremely sensitive to different types of ice — so the radar image clearly delineates the older, rougher surface of icebergs from surrounding sea ice, while optical sensors simply show a continuity of snow-covered ice.

Envisat’s ASAR instrument monitors Antarctica in two different modes: Global Monitoring Mode (GMM) provides 400-kilometre swath one-kilometre resolution images, enabling rapid mosaicking of the whole of Antarctica to monitor changes in sea ice extent, ice shelves and iceberg movement.

Wide Swath Mode (WSM) possesses the same swath but with 150-metre resolution for a detailed view of areas of particular interest.

ASAR GMM images are routinely provided to a variety of users including the National Ice Center, responsible for tracking icebergs worldwide.

Related news

* New collision looks imminent for B-15A iceberg

  http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEM0V56TI8E_index_0.html

* B-15A collides with Antarctic ice tongue

  http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMEGLW797E_index_0.html

* Giant iceberg B-15A edges past floating ice pier

  http://www.esa.int/esaEO/SEMQ5FRMD6E_index_0.html

* B-15A iceberg’s close encounter monitored by Envisat

  http://www.esa.int/esaEO/SEMIWT71Y3E_index_0.html

Related missions

* Envisat overview

  http://www.esa.int/esaEO/SEMWYN2VQUD_index_0_m.html

In depth

* Earthwatching: B-15A

http://earth.esa.int/ew/special_events/iceberg-b15_antartic/

Related links

* US National Ice Center   http://www.natice.noaa.gov/

IMAGE CAPTIONS:

[Image 1: http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMCYK638FE_index_1.html] The break-up of B-15A in progress off Cape Adare on 30 October 2005, as seen Envisat’s ASAR in Wide Swath Mode.

Credits: ESA

[Image 2: http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMCYK638FE_index_1.html#subhead1] Individual pieces of B-15A moving northward by currents from Cape Adare, 3 November, seen in this Envisat ASAR Global Monitoring Mode image. The knife-shaped iceberg towards the bottom of the image is B-15K, a separate iceberg from the original B-15 iceberg which is unconnected to the recent B-15A break-up.

Credits: ESA

[Image 3: http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMCYK638FE_index_1.html#subhead2] The 27-28 October break-up of B-15A occurred off Cape Adare, the northernmost extent of Queen Victoria Land, close to the former base of Cape Hallett. The original B-15 calved from the Ross Ice Shelf to the south, facing the Ross Sea, back in May 2000.

[Image 4: http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMCYK638FE_index_1.html#subhead3] B-15A still appeared intact in this Envisat ASAR image acquired 27 October in Global Monitoring Mode.

Credits: ESA

[Image 5: http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMCYK638FE_index_1.html#subhead4] The break-up of B-15A has started in this Envisat ASAR image acquired 28 October in Global Monitoring Mode. The splits are likely to have occurred along existing lines of weakness in the stranded iceberg.

Credits: ESA