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Science Team Places Sensors on Enormous Iceberg to Track Motion, Weather Conditions
National Science Foundation- funded researchers, with the assistance of the U.S. Coast Guard Icebreaker Polar Sea, have erected towers directly on a fragment of an enormous iceberg that broke off the Ross Shelf in Antarctica in March 2000. The fragment, designated B-15A, is approximately 15 stories above the water (150 feet) and is 90 miles long and 30 miles wide. Sensors on the towers monitor the movement and weather. Hourly updates are sent by satellite to researchers Doug Macayeal at the University of Chicago and Matt Lazarra at the University of Wisconsin at Madison who track B-15 to understand, and predict the paths of future icebergs. Iceberg B-15A is a piece of one of the largest icebergs ever recorded to have broken away from Antarctica's Ross Ice Shelp. The original iceberg, called B-15, was 180 miles long and 22 miles wide -- almost the same size as Massachusetts. B-15 has since broken into two large pieces -- B-15A and B-15B. B-15A is drifting toward McMurdo Sound.. The National Science Foundation's McMurdo Station, the largest scientific research station on the continent, is located on Ross Island in the Sound. The National Ice Center, in Suitland, MD., makes worldwide sea ice analyses and gives a name to icebergs that are at least 10 nautical miles long. The letter represents the quadrant of Antarctica in which the iceberg calved and the number is for how many icebergs have calved there. B-15 was the 15th iceberg to calve in Antarctica's B quadrant since the center started keeping records.
Broadcasters: B-Roll of the B-15 iceberg is available on Betacam SP, contact NSF's Dena Headlee, (703) 292-8070/dheadlee@nsf.gov. See also: B-15A slide show. For more information contact:
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