A giant slab of ice bigger than the Spanish island of Majorca has sheared off the edge of Antarctica into the Weddell Sea to become the largest iceberg afloat, the European Space Agency said on Wednesday. Its surface area spans 4,320sq km (1,668 sq miles) and measures 175km (106 miles) long by 25km wide. A-76, which broke away from Antarctica’s Ronne Ice Shelf, is now the largest iceberg on the planet, surpassing the now second-place A-23A, about 3,380sq km in size and also floating in the Weddell Sea. Another massive Antarctic iceberg that had threatened a penguin-populated island off the southern tip of South America has since lost much of its mass and broken into pieces, scientists said earlier this year. The Ronne Ice Shelf near the base of the Antarctic Peninsula is one of the largest of several enormous floating sheets of ice that connect to the continent’s landmass and extend out into surrounding seas.

Source: The Irish Times May 20, 2021 12:09 UTC