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Some named Antarctic iceshelves. Ice shelf extending approximately 6 miles into the Antarctic Sound from Joinville Island. An ice shelf is "a floating slab of ice originating from land of considerable thickness extending from the coast (usually of great horizontal extent with a very gently sloping surface), resulting from the flow of ice sheets, initially formed by the accumulation of snow ...
Shelf ice is a floating mat of ice, but unlike a pond or a small lake that freezes over, the shelf is not a uniform sheet of ice. Created by the wind and waves, the shelf ice is a jumble of ice chunks, pushed onto each other. It is as if you took a pile of rubble and pushed up against a wall.
The West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) is the segment of the continental ice sheet that covers West Antarctica, the portion of Antarctica on the side of the Transantarctic Mountains that lies in the Western Hemisphere. It is classified as a marine-based ice sheet, meaning that its bed lies well below sea level and its edges flow into floating ice ...
The WAIS is classified as a marine-based ice sheet, meaning that its bed lies below sea level and its edges flow into floating ice shelves. [7] [14] The WAIS is bounded by the Ross Ice Shelf, the Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf, and outlet glaciers that drain into the Amundsen Sea. [15]
An iceberg is a piece of fresh water ice more than 15 meters (16 yards) long [1] that has broken off a glacier or an ice shelf and is floating freely in open water. [2] [3] Smaller chunks of floating glacially derived ice are called "growlers" or "bergy bits".
Drifting ice station – Research stations built on the ice of the high latitudes of the Arctic Ocean; Iceberg – Large piece of freshwater ice broken off a glacier or ice shelf and floating in open water; Ice shove – Ice pushed onshore due to water movements or wind; Lead (sea ice) – Fracture that opens up in an expanse of sea ice
Ice sheets are bigger than ice shelves or alpine glaciers. Masses of ice covering less than 50,000 km 2 are termed an ice cap. An ice cap will typically feed a series of glaciers around its periphery. Although the surface is cold, the base of an ice sheet is generally warmer due to geothermal heat. In places, melting occurs and the melt-water ...
An ice floe (/ f l oʊ /) is a large pack of floating ice often defined as a flat piece at least 20 m across at its widest point, and up to more than 10 km across. [1] Drift ice is a floating field of sea ice composed of several ice floes. They may cause ice jams on freshwater rivers, and in the open ocean may damage the hulls of ships.