To the untrained eye, Antarctica may look like a giant piece of solid ice that rarely changes, but scientists studying the continent have long known better. The icy surface is dynamic, with glaciers and "streams" of ice flowing toward the ocean.
Published Apr 27, 2007
This image shows the latest estimate of the ice edge around Law Promontory, which juts out from East Antarctica’s coastline near Stefansson Bay.
Published Jul 23, 2010
In January 2015, a new iceberg broke off from an ice shelf in East Antarctica that had otherwise been quiet for decades.
Published Feb 7, 2015
Throughout Antarctica, broad ribbons of ice known as ice streams shed large quantities of ice into the ocean.
Published Apr 24, 2007
A slab of ice larger than the continental United States smothers much of East Antarctica. Draining from the East Antarctic Ice Sheet is a river of ice nearly 800 kilometers long. This stream, the Recovery Ice Stream, slides roughly 35 billion tons of ice into the ocean each year.
Published Apr 26, 2007
Researchers working in Antarctica have found evidence of large-scale ice making at the bottom of that continent's massive ice sheets.
Published Apr 21, 2011
Named after American Antarctic explorer Richard E. Byrd, West Antarctica’s Byrd Glacier flows through a deep valley in the Transantarctic Mountains, covering a distance of 180 kilometers (112 miles) and descending more than 1,300 meters (4,300 feet) as it flows into the Ross Ice Shelf.
Published Jan 19, 2006
A floating shelf of ice attached to the coast of Antarctica appears ready to shed an iceberg into the Southern Ocean.
Published Mar 10, 2016
When this closely watched slab of floating ice births a giant iceberg, it will not be the first time it has seen dramatic change.
Published Feb 7, 2017Image of the Day Heat Land Water Snow and Ice Sea and Lake Ice
Moderate-resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) satellite imagery analyzed at the University of Colorado’s National Snow and Ice Data Center revealed that the northern section of the Larsen B ice shelf, a large floating ice mass on the eastern side of the Antarctic Peninsula, has shattered and separated from the continent. This particular image was taken on March 5, 2002.
Published Mar 20, 2002
