Have you tweeted your outrage about the giant iceberg yet?

According to a University of Leeds professor named Andrew Shepherd, 'Everyone loves a good iceberg, and this one is a corker.' It's nice to see scientists having a good time – some of them don't get out much.

So, true or false, froods? Here's the gen.

1. The new iceberg calved off the Larsen C Ice Shelf in Antarctica. The ice shelf is named after a Norwegian whaling captain. True. Captain Carl Anton Larsen explored the area in 1893.
2. The giant iceberg is the size of Texas. False. Texans would be outraged. No iceberg is as big as they are.
3. The giant iceberg is twice the size of Luxembourg. True. That's more like it. The iceberg dwarfs that puny country. For US readers the reference is Delaware. For people in the UK, our favourite glaciologist, Martin O'Leary, has posted this helpful comparison with the A68 motorway on Twitter.
4. The giant iceberg (which really needs a name, don't you think?) is the biggest in history. False. But it's probably one of the ten biggest. And I think we should call it Jerry. Jerry the Iceberg.
5. The iceberg probably won't break up, making it a major hazard to shipping. False. There are cracks, it will probably calve again.
6. All scientists are in agreement that the Larsen C iceberg incident is definitely the result of man-made climate change. False. Scientists pretty much agree that ice shelves breaking off is a natural thing that happens. US glacier expert Twila Moon [real name] says she thinks climate change may have hurried it along a bit.
7. The iceberg will definitely raise the world's sea level because of Science. False. The ice shelf is already floating. Look: Anna Hogg is an expert glacier-watcher from Leeds, and she thinks like a real galactic hitchhiker, and even uses satellites to study the ice. She explains this in terms even we can understand: 'It’s like your ice cube in your gin and tonic – it is already floating and if it melts it doesn’t change the volume of water in the glass by very much at all.'
8. The Larsen C Ice Shelf is now 12% smaller, but ice shelf weight loss is a normal occurrence. True. 'My, you've really lost weight, my dear. Must be the new diet.'
9. The Paris Accords would definitely have prevented this iceberg from calving. False. The Paris Climate Accords can do many, many good things for Earth. Telling Antarctica to stop breaking up is not one of them. However, not warming up the planet is something we can all work on, and if all of Antarctica melted, the seas would do some serious rising indeed.
10. Celine Dion has already composed a song in the iceberg's honour. False. Not that we know of. But we invite you to submit your lyrics, and we'll see if we can get the chanteuse's attention.

We hope this quiz amused you. We also hope it helped to clear up some questions about what's going on down there. If you want to know more, why not call up the Port Lockroy Post Office? They have a better view.

Dmitri Gheorgheni

17.07.17 Front Page

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