A23A: Riesenisberg on a collision course with island

The largest iceberg in the world is on a collision course with a remote British island and possibly put penguins and seals in danger.

The Eisberg turns from the Antarctic towards South Georgia to the north, a robust British territory and Wildlife port, where it could be ground and smashed into pieces. It is currently 280 km away.

Countless birds and seals died to feed on the icy bays and beaches of South Georgia, when former huge icebergs had stopped them.

“Eisbergs are naturally dangerous. I would be extremely happy if we just missed it completely,” Sea Captain Simon Wallace told BBC News and speaks of the government ship of South Georgia Pharos.

All over the world, a group of scientists, seafarers and fishermen sees satellite images anxiously to monitor the daily movements of this queen of the icebergs.

It is known as A23a And is one of the oldest in the world.

It calves or broke out of the Filchner ice rink in the Antarctic in 1986, but got stuck on the sea floor and then caught in an oceanvortex.

Finally it was freed in December and is now on his last trip and is forgotten.

The warmer water north of the Antarctic melts and weakens its wide sides, which extend up to 1,312 feet, larger than the shard in London.

It measured once 3,900 km², but the latest satellite images show that it is slowly falsifying. It is now around 3,500 m² in size, about the size of the English county of Cornwall.

And large ice sheets break off and plunge into the water around its edges.

A23A could collapse every day into huge segments, which can then hang around for years, such as floating ice cities in South Georgia uncontrollably.

This is not the first huge iceberg that threatens South Georgia and Sandwich Islands.

2004 called A38, which left the beach on the beaches on his continental Schelf Band and Dead Penguinküken and sealing puppies when massive chunks of ice blocked their access to feeding areas.

In the area, precious colonies of royal spenguins and millions of elephant and fur seals are home to.

“South Georgia is located in the Eisberg Alley, so that the effects for both fishing and wildlife are expected and both have a great ability to adapt,” says Mark Belchier, a marine ecologist who advises the government of South Georgia.

Sailers and fishermen say that icebergs are an increasing problem. In 2023 a 76 was startled when it came close to the ground.

“The parts of it tipped over, so they looked like great ice towers, an ice cream town on the horizon,” says Mr. Belchier, who saw the iceberg at sea.

These plates still linger on the islands to this day.

“It is in pieces the size of several Wembley stadiums to the size of your desk,” says Andrew Newman from Argos Froyanes, a fishing company that works in South Georgia.

“Basically, these pieces cover the island – we have to work through,” says Captain Wallace.

The seafarers on his ship have to be constantly vigilant. “We have search light all night to try to see ice cream – it can come out of nowhere,” he explains.

According to Mr. Newman, A76 was a “gamechanger” with “enormous effects on our operations and on the safety of our ship and our crew”.

All three men describe a rapidly changing environment with a visible glacier retreat from year to year and volatile mirror on sea ice.

It is unlikely that the climate change will be behind the birth of A23A, since it was calmed down so long before a large part of the effects of rising temperatures that we now see.

But huge icebergs are part of our future. If the Antarctic becomes more unstable with warmer ocean and air temperatures, large parts of the ice sheets are canceled.

Before his time comes to an end, A23A left a farewell gift for scientists.

A team of the British Antarctic survey on Sir David Attenborough research ship was near A23a in 2023.

The scientists tried to take the rare opportunity to investigate what Mega ice ranges do with the environment.

The ship sailed into a crack in the huge walls of the iceberg, and doctoral student Laura Taylor collected precious water samples from its cliffs.

“As far as I could see, analysis of the rehearsals.

Their work examines what effects the melting water has on the carbon cycle in the southern ocean.

“This is not just water like we drink. It is full of nutrients and chemicals as well as tiny animals such as phytoplankton that are frozen inside,” says Ms. Taylor.

As it melts, the iceberg fills these elements into the water and changes the physics and chemistry of the ocean.

This could save more carbon deep in the ocean if the particles drop from the surface. Of course, this would complete some of the planet’s carbon dioxide emissions that contribute to climate change.

Eisbergs are notoriously unpredictable and nobody knows exactly what it will do next.

But soon the giant should appear on the horizons of the islands, as large as the territory itself.