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Cryospheric Sciences

iceberg

Cryo-adventures: Ninja goes south – Life and science onboard an icebreaker in the Weddell Sea (Antarctica)

November 19, 2021
Cryo-adventures: Ninja goes south – Life and science onboard an icebreaker in the Weddell Sea (Antarctica)

Hello there! I’m Ninja – a curious little LEGO-figure who doesn’t know much about the cryosphere, but who’s learning! Maybe you read about me in the blogpost by ice sheet modeler Petra Langebroek a few years ago? She brought me to the ice-core drilling camp called EASTgrip, on top of the Greenland icesheet. Together, we wrote a photo-novel to tell her sons and all of you about life and science at ...[Read More]

Mapping sea ice from space

September 10, 2021
Mapping sea ice from space
Figure 1. The thinning and retreating of sea ice have led to increased human activity in Arctic waters. Hence, marine traffic and activities such as fishing, shipping, oil and mineral exploitation are expected to increase in the future. To handle navigation in ice-covered waters, vessel crews need appropriate planning support. [Credit: Alex Perz/Unsplash]

Reduced and thinner sea ice makes Arctic waters increasingly appealing for shipping, fishing, tourism, and mineral exploration. However, with increased accessibility and more dynamic ice conditions comes a greater risk for ship crews to encounter sea ice and icebergs outside of their usual seasonal limits. To help them navigate, timely and reliable sea ice information is key. Have you wondered how ...[Read More]

Climate Change & Cryosphere – A brief history of A68, the world’s largest iceberg

September 25, 2020

In July 2017, the world’s largest iceberg known as A68 calved from the Larsen C Ice Shelf, located in the western Weddell Sea, Antarctica. Since then, A68 has lost two chunks of ice, A68-B and A68-C, but still remains a giant after more than 3 years. How did it feel to be the greatest, A68? Being the greatest With a length of 175 km and being about 50 km wide, this giant iceberg also appropriately ...[Read More]

Cryo-Comm – Capturing Ice

September 27, 2019
Cryo-Comm – Capturing Ice
Marlo Garnsworthy’s artwork is inspired by her time spent on the rough seas of the Antarctic [Credit: Marlo Garnsworthy].

In this week’s blogpost, author, editor, artist, and outreach expert Marlo Garnsworthy gives some insights into her recent trip to Iceberg Alley, gives you some tips on how to communicate icy science, and shows us her inspirational artwork. If you’re reading this, ice may be on your mind. Ice is surely on mine. During my day job as a creative and editor, I dip frequently into Twitter for the lates ...[Read More]

Image of the Week — Into Iceberg Alley

March 22, 2019

Crew in hardhats and red safety gear bustle about, preparing our ship for departure. A whale spouts nearby in the Straits of Magellan, a fluke waving in brief salute, before it submerges again. Our international team of 29 scientists and 2 science communicators, led by co-Chief Scientists Mike Weber and Maureen Raymo, is boarding the JOIDES Resolution, a scientific drilling ship. We’re about to jo ...[Read More]

Image of the Week – Super-cool colours of icebergs

March 30, 2018
Image of the Week – Super-cool colours of icebergs
Fig.1: Clear blue marine ice visible on an upturned iceberg [Credit: Stephen Warren].

It is Easter weekend! And as we do not want you to forget about our beloved cryosphere, we provide you with a picture nearly as colourful as the Easter eggs: very blue icebergs! What makes them so special? This is what this Image of the Week is about… What are icebergs made of? Icebergs are chunks of ice which break off from land ice, such as glaciers or ice sheets (as you’ll know if you rem ...[Read More]

Back to the Front – Larsen C Ice Shelf in the Aftermath of Iceberg A68!

November 8, 2017
Back to the Front – Larsen C Ice Shelf in the Aftermath of Iceberg A68!
Figure 1: A68 sets sail from Larsen C.
Sentinel 1 SAR image [Credit: Adrian Luckman, Swansea University].

Much of the Antarctic continent is fringed by ice shelves. An ice shelf is the floating extension of a terrestrial ice mass and, as such, is an important ‘middleman’ that regulates the delivery of ice from land into the ocean: for much of Antarctica, ice that passes from land into the sea does so via ice shelves. I’ve been conducting geophysical experiments on ice for over a decade, using mostly s ...[Read More]

Image of the Week – Ice Ice Bergy

May 19, 2017
Image of the Week – Ice Ice Bergy
An iceberg travelling by Greenland. [Credit: Credit: Romain Schläppy, distributed via imaggeo.egu.eu]

They come in all shapes, sizes and textures. They can be white, deep blue or brownish. Sometimes they even have penguins on them. It is time to (briefly) introduce this element of the cryosphere that has not been given much attention in this blog yet: icebergs! What is an iceberg? Let’s start with the basics. An iceberg, which literally translates as “ice mountain”, is a bit of fresh ice that brok ...[Read More]

Image of the Week — Glowing Ice

May 6, 2016
Image of the Week — Glowing Ice
Glowing ice -- winning picture of the EGU photo contest 2016. The image shows a block of ice on the shores of Jökulsárlón, Iceland. [credit: Katharine Cashman (distributed via imaggeo.egu.eu)]

Two weeks ago, the EGU General Assembly was coming to an end in Vienna. With over 16,500 participants, this year’s edition was bigger and more varied than ever (e.g check out this good overview of the science-policy short course, published 2 days ago on geolog). The week was particularly fruitful for the cryospheric sciences and to mark this we have cherry-picked one of the winning picture o ...[Read More]