Antarctica may have experienced its warmest day ever recorded last Tuesday, with a temperature reading of 17.5°C...
It was colder in New York City than in Antarctica last Tuesday.
This record high temperature follows another high reading of 17.4°C set just the day before. Until last week's heat wave, the highest-known recorded temperature on the continent was 17°C back in 1976.
The Antarctic Peninsula, where the readings were made at Argentina's Esperanza Base and Marambio Base, "is one of the fastest warming spots on Earth," reports The Weather Undergound.
The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) has not yet certified that this week's temperatures are all-time weather records for Antarctica, though the Argentinian weather service has verified that the temperatures were the highest ever measured at each site.
We already know our warming world is having a huge impact on the poles, with extensive research confirming that both the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets are losing ice mass and contributing to sea level rise.
But this is just the tip of the iceberg. Most of us have no idea of what a huge chunk of ice breaking off from a glacier actually looks like, or the destruction that it can cause especially for surrounding animal life.
Mark Brandon, who is a reader in Polar Oceanography at The Open University, says 900 billion tonnes of ice can leave quite a messy trail.
In 2010 an iceberg containing almost 900 billion tonnes of fresh water broke free, and in 2013 a massive iceberg, larger than the city of Chicago, broke off of Antarctica's Pine Island Glacier and was floating freely in the Amundsen Sea. That gives you some idea of just how much ice we're talking about. They can tower 100 metres above the sea, and reach several hundred more below the surface.
When an iceberg breaks away, they don't just drift smoothly away from the continent. They crash and bounce, writes Brandon, along any relatively shallow region of the sea floor and wipe out anything in their way.
Brandon uses the example of trawling, which we all know harms the sea floor. Now imagine the trail of damage 900 billion tonnes of ice scraping on the sea floor can leave.
Also, open water throughout winter helps seals and penguins survive, and stimulates phytoplankton production.
When still close to shore these giant bergs mean penguins suddenly have to travel much further – around the iceberg – to find open sea, and their food.
Chicks growing up near a massive iceberg may starve and die and some entire colonies may become unviable.- Writes Mark Brandon
The breaking up, and subsequent rapid thinning and draining of ice bergs is a much more layered issue than most people think, leading to significant increase in sea levels but also huge changes to the natural systems.
The more global warming we see, the more likely that we'll see more dramatic melting events.
So what can you do? Take the 1 Million Women Carbon Challenge, to cut CO2 pollution from your everyday life and take your first steps towards a cleaner Earth.
