12/3/2023 0 Comments Real iceberg underwater![]() These are radar satellites, using SAR (synthetic aperture radar). I don't know about exotic, but whenever I think about how some of these satellite observation systems actually work, my mind starts to boggle.įor example, we use a lot of data from ESA's Sentinel-1 satellite pair. As I understand it that boat has since caught fire and sank. Of course then the wind picked up, and I had a few nights of icebergs bouncing off the hull a few inches from my head, but them's the breaks. We spent a few days on a tiny boat in gorgeously still conditions - the icebergs damp out all the waves so the water is like a mirror. We wanted to get oceanographic data (trying to see how much warm water was getting up-fjord to the glacier front), but the fjord was choked with icebergs, so none of the proper research vessels could get up there. I guess my favourite was probably going up Sermilik fjord in Greenland in a little fishing boat. "Exciting" fieldwork is usually Type II fun, like hiding in a tent while a polar bear eats the seat off your snowmobile (happened to a colleague). Also, you don't really want your fieldwork to be "exciting". Well, I'm not much of a field-worker - I spend most of my time in front of a computer in a nice warm office. So we're not concerned about it - we already have too many things to be concerned about without worrying about this. So this doesn't look like evidence of anything bad, and it doesn't look like it's going to have any negative consequences. However, we don't think this is likely, given the new shape of the ice shelf. This would have had some small (maybe a few mm) knock-on effects on global sea level. If the berg had been a bit bigger, it might have reduced the backstress on the glaciers behind the ice shelf, which would have led them to discharge more ice into the sea. As far as we can tell, this isn't going to have any major negative impacts on the ice shelf. On the other hand, we can look at the consequences. We can't completely rule out climate change as a cause of this, but we don't have an obvious connection either. In this case, it's a particularly large bit, but that's just how it goes sometimes. All of that ice has to go somewhere! Either the ice shelf grows and grows, or bits have to break off. Ice builds up on ice shelves over time, both from glaciers which feed them, and from snowfall. Icebergs this size are an infrequent but natural event. ![]() Well, I usually think we need a good reason to be concerned, so I guess the question is why should we be? I think we should be concerned either if an event is evidence for something bad, or if it is likely to have bad consequences.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |