Wilkins Northern Edge Collapse Under Way - NYC-Sized Glacial Calving Confirmed By ESA

An area of an Antarctic ice shelf almost the size of New York City has broken into icebergs this month after the collapse of an ice bridge widely blamed on global warming, a scientist said today. "The northern ice front of the Wilkins Ice Shelf has become unstable and the first icebergs have been released," Angelika Humbert, glaciologist at the University of Muenster in Germany, said of European Space Agency satellite images of the shelf.

Humbert told Reuters about 700 sq km of ice - bigger than Singapore or Bahrain and almost the size of New York - has broken off the Wilkins this month and shattered into a mass of icebergs. She said 370 sq kms of ice had cracked up in recent days from the Shelf, the latest of about 10 shelves on the Antarctic Peninsula to retreat in a trend linked by the UN Climate Panel to global warming.

The new icebergs added to 330 sq kms of ice that broke up earlier this month with the shattering of an ice bridge apparently pinning the Wilkins in place between Charcot island and the Antarctic Peninsula.

Nine other shelves - ice floating on the sea and linked to the coast - have receded or collapsed around the Antarctic peninsula in the past 50 years, often abruptly like the Larsen A in 1995 or the Larsen B in 2002.


EDIT

http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/new-yorksized-ice-collapses-off-antarctica-1675400.html

I haven't found a way to express what I'm seeing. I suppose it would be that no real positive changes are happening. And there is a reason. We can't change.

There are two ways in which we can alter our course. Decrease the population, or decrease carbon emissions. The only way we can decrease carbon emissions is to stop burning fuel.

So that brings one to the scenario that I spend a lot of time thinking about. What does "stop burning fuel" mean? Or rather how does "stop burning fuel" affect us? To put it simply, it translates to "do stuff for yourself". And if one looks closely at what that is, they can see that it isn't possible to live the modern lifestyle we're living. It's difficult for me to write this in an abbreviated form, because the number of things that contribute to our modern lifestyle is utterly staggering. And in a way, beautiful. Although ultimately ugly. I turn my head and see a mountain bike sitting here that has materials and engineering that took centuries to evolve. A frame built in China. Multiple flights back and forth for design and manufacturing support. Marketing. Peripheral parts that have their own world of complexities. Planes flying parts, mining, manufacturing. In other words, an entire modern society. Humming away in planes, cars, trucks, boats, trains, on petroleum. All over the planet. And it's increasing. You buy a Prius, and ten people buy a new car in India and China. You screw in a compact fluorescent, and 100 lights switch on in the growing part of the planet.

We lived off of the fruits that were here, up until the early part of the last century. I now have to think hard to imagine that we could live off of it at all now. Perhaps a small garden? I don't think so. Not unless one owns land. Sure, it all seems possible, until you start thinking of the peripherals. You can make soap. But can you make everything else you need? And don't just think of yourself, think of the millions in New York city, and other densely populated places.

I see a corner, and we're in it. And nothing would make me happier than to be wrong. But monstrous melting of what I believe is a critical part of the planet's regulating mechanism makes me think we're very quickly headed for a change in the other factor of the equation.

...or more precisely, a shitload of soon-to-be additional fresh water...

For the past decade or so, indeed with the Larsen ice shelves, we constantly hear about how ice is dissapearing at an untold rate and so forth. If sea level remains constant across the globe, then why is it that I still have to walk the same distance to the water from the cottage I rent on Cape Cod? Let's say for the sake of argument that the sea level has risen an imperceptable amount at Cape Cod, and it is 100% due to human activity.

If human industrial activity is the cause, then the answer is simple: reduce industrial activity. I'm not in favor of bigger government to get this done. More goverment power, on an empirical level, is bad. So how does one reduce their "carbon footprint"? Do they buy carbon offsets? Pass a law? The answer is far more simple and passive:

Work less, spend less.

Anyone who works full-time is a contibutor to global warming in the worst way. The company you work for has to generate emmissions through commerce and industry to give you a paycheck. By the way, the government takes a big chunk of that. Therefore, the bigger goverment gets, the bigger it carbon-emits by virtue of what it has to take from its citizens.

Not buying a $10 item allows you to "not work" for the $15 (remember taxes) it would take to buy it. You'll also have the added benefit of the free time you had while not working for the $15.

A lot to think about. Discuss.

Well, this here recession/depression thingy is gonna be mighty good for Pachamama then...

So, the effect on sea levels is insignificant. The effect on albedo has been quite large.