Big chunk of Antarctic ice shelf falling apart

AFP, March, 2008

WASHINGTON (AFP) — Antarctica's massive Wilkins Ice Shelf has begun disintegrating under the effects of global warming, satellite images by the University of Colorado's National Snow and Ice Data Center showed.

The collapse of a substantial section of the shelf was triggered February 28 when an iceberg measuring 41 by 2.4 kilometers (25.5 by 1.5 miles) broke off its southwestern front.

That movement led to disintegration of the shelf's interior, of which 414 square kilometers (160 square miles) have already disappeared, scientists say.

The Wilkins Ice Shelf is a broad plate of permanent floating ice 1,609 kilometers (1,000 miles) south of South America, on the southwest Antarctic Peninsula.

Now, as a result of recent losses, a large part of the 12,950 square kilometer (5,000 square mile) shelf is supported by a narrow 5.6 kilometer (3.5 mile) strip of ice between two islands, ...