West Antarctica

What’s white, weighs roughly one trillion metric tons, and is now heading away from the Antarctic Peninsula? If you guessed iceberg A23a, you’re absolutely right, as this colossal chunk of snow and ice is finally leaving the cradle.Alex Winter on the Most Important Modern Horror Movie Iceberg A23a managed to dislodge itself from the ocean floor in November 2023, but its story actually began 37 years earlier. West Antarctica’s Filchner Ice Sheet birthed the behemoth in 1986, but shortly after its emergence, iceberg A23a…

An Antarctic iceberg at sunset.Photo: Sergio Pitamitz / VWPics (AP)The Thwaites Glacier, one of the most unstable parts of Antarctica’s ice sheet, could be gearing up for even more rapid changes than we previously thought. In a study published this week in Nature Geoscience, a team of researchers have published new images of the ocean’s floor that they say provide valuable information about how the glacier may have retreated during past warm periods. The insights could give a scary warning about the future of sea level…