Things that go bump in the night. April 20, 2005 4:40 AM Subscribe
As predicted and previously discussed, the world's largest collision took place in Antarctica when a 115km (71mile) long iceberg collided with the Drygalski ice tongue in McMurdo Sound.
The resulting satellite photographs show the results of the collision quite clearly, but somehow fail to convey the sheer scale of the event.
posted by bap98189 (24 comments total)
A somewhat better picture here, also from New Scientist. posted by zardoz at 5:16 AM on April 20, 2005
Jeez - that's big. About twice as big as the Island on which I live. The mind boggles...
Imagine the noise it would have made?! Strange that none of the articles seem to mention how fast the 'berg was moving - although they imply that the two "smashed" together... posted by Chunder at 6:07 AM on April 20, 2005
zardoz: "A somewhat better picture here, also from New Scientist."
That picture is from January, when the iceberg ran aground. posted by Plutor at 6:16 AM on April 20, 2005
Heh - the Google locator thing gets confused when you search for any information about this iceberg...
It thinks I'm after "a iceberg" in the locality of B15 (Birmingham, England) :-) Oops!
Anyway - I found out that it was travelling at 2km per day. Not too fast, but *lots* of momentum... can't find anything that'll tell me the height of the ice protruding out of the water, but even if it's only 100m then that would imply that there's 3x10^11 cubic metres of ice above water (based on a surface area of 3,000 square kilometres).
Of course, my maths/physics is a probably a bit rusty... but it strikes me that a collision involving a lump of ice this massive would do more than just cause a slight "bump"...
As an aside, there's a whole load of worry that melting icebergs will cause sea levels to rise. But what about the consideration of the displacement of the sea by the ice. When the ice goes, the sea level will no longer be displaced as much, and thus the rise may not be as much.
Anyway, totally OT... this all just got me thinking :-) posted by Chunder at 7:19 AM on April 20, 2005
No, Chunder, the displacement is the same when it melts as when it's solid. It displaces its own mass, and the mass doesn't change when it goes from solid to liquid.
It raised the sea level a little bit when it broke off the Ross ice shelf. Previously it had been supported by land, and was not displacing as much. posted by breath at 7:26 AM on April 20, 2005
Mass doesn't matter so much. It's the density and volume that we should be concerned with. posted by Alison at 7:35 AM on April 20, 2005
"World's largest collision"? I'm sure the dinosaurs would disagree. posted by Pretty_Generic at 7:45 AM on April 20, 2005
Very interesting. Sea ice is tremendously noisy in general, grinding and squeaking as well as a near constant low rumble as it moves. The sound of a collision this big this must have been something else. posted by fshgrl at 8:18 AM on April 20, 2005
Great post! So... if you press *your* tonge to the ice tongue, will it stick forever? posted by dfowler at 8:20 AM on April 20, 2005
People get paid to track this stuff? I want in! posted by bardic at 8:22 AM on April 20, 2005
“It was more of a bump in the night [than the] collision of the century,” admits Mark Drinkwater, head of ESA’s oceans and ice unit in The Netherlands.
Chunder... I was working on your calculations in my head... looking at all the cool scienti... [HEAD ALL ASPLOOOOOOOOOODE] posted by AspectRatio at 2:50 PM on April 20, 2005
Did ya ever notice that "scientists" go on and on about some major disaster about to happen, only to have the "disaster" fizzle like a wet bottle rocket?
Now, what really worries me is when they say "Nothing to worry about here, folks. Nothing can possibly go wrong."
Subscribe
posted by zardoz at 5:16 AM on April 20, 2005