13 ms·

The large crack in the Antarctic ice shelf has grown 6 miles

147 points by grahamel 10y ago

Nux 10y ago
I think it's coming after Trump.
mabbo 10y ago
For thousands of years, soothsayers and prophets have predicted the end of the world. Kind of neat that we get to actually watch it happen and understand they whys and hows.
- jdimov11 10y ago
  For thousands of years they have been 100% wrong - no exceptions. What makes you think you are more capable of fucking up than everyone before you? You're not. Generally speaking, you're also not particularly smarter than people 10 000 years ago. Sure, you have somewhat more advanced technology, but you are grossly overestimating the impact of your actions, especially since you have practically ZERO understanding of how the natural world actually works. Chill. Move on with your life. Have more fun. Make things. Don't worry about breaking things. The end of the world is not one of your problems.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- adrianN 10y ago
  Climate change is not the end of the world. The climate has been warmer in the past and CO2 levels higher. The transition period until the climate stabilizes at a higher temperature will be uncomfortable because of problems with agriculture, sea level rise and so on, but I don't think it will wipe out modern civilization.
  - treehau5 10y ago
    All of those changes will cause great pains and tribulations for the most vulnerable. Maybe we can genetically engineer more drought-resistant plants or whatnot, but the farmers in rural parts of third-world-countries will suffer, while what's left of their freshwater supplies dry. Once the coral reefs are wiped out from the increased acidification of the oceans, another hundred or so million will starve to death because they rely on food from the ocean.
    - adrianN 10y ago
      Of course, as I said the transition period will be uncomfortable. A few hundred million people dying over a time of a couple of decades is very different from the end of the world though.
      - spraak 10y ago
        Generally I think "the end of the world" is the end of those observing the world (us, humans). So most of the population dying sounds like the end..
      - treehau5 10y ago
        That transition period is unacceptable. It is unacceptable to accept it as an inevitability, and it is unacceptable to view a few hundred million as inconsequential, especially when the tools are present to solve the issue. In my eyes, once we get to the point where our complacency has allowed us to even think in these terms and still be able to sleep comfortably at night, we have already lost (I'm no exception, and this isn't an accusation). We've allowed power to condense to a select few, and we all feel like small fries in the big global stage.
        adrianN 10y ago
        I agree that we should stop producing GHGs as quickly as possible. I'm just arguing that climate change is not the end of the world. In the same way you can argue that another global war is probably not the end of the world yet we should avoid it by all means.
woliveirajr 10y ago
If the cracking speed continues, it'll brake apart in few weeks. I'm curious if there are projections on where it'll float after it looses connection, given that certainly there are currents in the region, but I don't think that such huge mass wasn't used in drift calculations earlier.
- bebop 10y ago
  From what I have heard, it sounds like it will spend most of it's time in the South Sea. As it breaks apart smaller chunks can move farther north.
ComradeTaco 10y ago
I honestly believe the US isn't going to have enough political capital or will to do anything about climate change in next 15-20 years. What we will have to do regardless is deal with rising storm surges and sea levels. Pretty much every major city will need a significant storm barriers. We should consider land buy back on easily flooded harbor barriers, and perhaps even abandonment of smaller coastal communities. Unfortunately, the everglades are sunk, and Florida will become increasingly unlivable, as salt water infiltrates almost all groundwater supplies.
- jshawl 10y ago
  The US President (as of today) thinks climate change is a hoax - https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/265895292191248385?lang=en https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/26589529219124838...
  - Retric 10y ago
    Don't assume he is being honest when he says anything. Lying is practically the guys calling card. That said, he is unlikely to push climate change one way or another globally. With how cheap wand and solar has gotten coal is on the way out and would take significant subsides to become competitive.
    - merpnderp 10y ago
      Do you have any evidence it is solar and wind and not natural gas that have been undercutting coal?
      - mulletbum 10y ago
        There is some stuff out there. Check out this article http://bfy.tw/9azA http://bfy.tw/9azA
      - KirinDave 10y ago
        This is an odd request. Everything is undercutting coal. Coal has always been a rather expensive and dangerous technology, it's just that it's plentiful and in the land rights of Western powers. Other forms of energy have been undercutting it since thermal steam rigs started working in North African farms. Probably longer when you consider the history of wind power. If Natural Gas wasn't so arduous to obtain, a carbon liberator, and damaging to the water table to obtain, I suspect we'd be more excited about it.
castis 10y ago
Do we know how tall the walls of that rift are, and/or whether or not the material filling in the gap is at sea level?
- scarletham 10y ago
  Last I saw, ~300ft wide and ~1700ft deep. https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/rift-in-antarcticas-larsen-c-ice-shelf https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/rift-in-antarcticas-larse...
enlightenedfool 10y ago
Is there a prediction model for the coastal line recession over the next few decades? A map with timelines would be great.
- dnm 10y ago
  For the USA: https://coast.noaa.gov/slr/ https://coast.noaa.gov/slr/ (Sorry, no timeline, just predictions by feet).
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
neom 10y ago
I believe this is the same crack that we discussed a couple weeks back: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13365211 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13365211
- grahamel 10y ago
  It is yeah (Larsen C ice shelf)
lolive 10y ago
Trump: "Whassup???" Cthulhu : "Whassup!!! Guess what? I can now attend your president party! There is a massive ice crack just upon R'lyeh :) " Trump: "Global warming FTW \o/ Will you sing the hymn? That would ROOCK!" Cthulhu: "It sure will be a MASSIVE loss of sanity points for everyone!" Trump: "Yep. And that's just the beginning."
bedhead 10y ago
I believe in climate change, however, I'm not sure what the big deal is. It is a natural byproduct of increasing prosperity. Humanity can cope with the effects, and do so with relative ease. As a whole, the world gets better every day. Furthermore, the hyperbole (can extreme hyperbole exist or is that redundant?) that has developed around climate change is deeply troubling to me. The fear mongering and impending doom predictions remind me of religious extremists and worry me greatly. Look no further than comments right here which extrapolate a crack in an ice shelf to literally witnessing the end of the world as we know it. That so many people accept this detached extremism concerns me far more than weird weather patterns or a bunch of beach homes being exposed to storm damage.
- bicubic 10y ago
  > Humanity can cope with the effects, and do so with relative ease. While humanity will cope in the sense that the species will probably go on existing, the current human population of this planet only exists because a large number of ecological parameters are within the sweet spot. Anything that disrupts global food supply, anything that disrupts fresh water supply, will kill billions of people in a matter of decades. Rising sea levels will displace a moderate percentage of our population and be the catalyst for a new round of wars, but the real danger lies in the fact that we're in the middle of a major extinction event that's increasingly likely to leave most of the population in starvation.
  - bedhead 10y ago
    Your mind has been poisoned and I genuinely pity you.
    - Daishiman 10y ago
      So you're here to troll, really. You have a "belief", completely unfounded and unjustified, and you think it's better than what's being understood by science at its pinnacle. Brilliant, really.
- jcfrei 10y ago
macu 10y ago
The title of this article is missing a crucial "in 2 weeks" that actually gives meaning to 6 miles. I can't believe how poorly articles are titled. Qualifying information takes a few words.
chrshawkes 10y ago
Is it inappropriate to say there could soon be a good investment opportunity to buy beach houses say, a few blocks back from the beach?
dwaxe 10y ago
That's 9.6 kilometers for you metric folk. Someone has suggested a March breakup for the Ice block. That is the time of the Minimum Ice Extent. I would love to know what the projections are for how long it will take for this iceberg to melt. Imagine what adventures it will have traveling around the world with albatross, turtles and whales for company.
fny 10y ago
By the way, Scientists studying the rift don't attribute this event to climate change: > "This is probably not directly attributable to any warming in the region, although of course the warming won't have helped," says Luckman. "It's probably just simply a natural event that's just been waiting around to happen." [0] [0]: http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/01/16/509565462/an-ice-shelf-is-cracking-in-antarctica-but-not-for-the-reason-you-think http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/01/16/509565462/...
- refurb 10y ago
  Jesus Christ. 100+ comments with back-and-forth about climate change and the scientist who knows the most doesn't think it has anything to do with the crack.
SpikeDad 10y ago
Fortunately the US has solved that problem. Trump has removed all mentions of climate change from the Whitehouse website thereby fixing the problem.

147 points by grahamel 10y ago

Nux 10y ago

I think it's coming after Trump.

mabbo 10y ago

For thousands of years, soothsayers and prophets have predicted the end of the world. Kind of neat that we get to actually watch it happen and understand they whys and hows.

jdimov11 10y ago
For thousands of years they have been 100% wrong - no exceptions. What makes you think you are more capable of fucking up than everyone before you? You're not. Generally speaking, you're also not particularly smarter than people 10 000 years ago. Sure, you have somewhat more advanced technology, but you are grossly overestimating the impact of your actions, especially since you have practically ZERO understanding of how the natural world actually works. Chill. Move on with your life. Have more fun. Make things. Don't worry about breaking things. The end of the world is not one of your problems.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
adrianN 10y ago
Climate change is not the end of the world. The climate has been warmer in the past and CO2 levels higher. The transition period until the climate stabilizes at a higher temperature will be uncomfortable because of problems with agriculture, sea level rise and so on, but I don't think it will wipe out modern civilization.
- treehau5 10y ago
  All of those changes will cause great pains and tribulations for the most vulnerable. Maybe we can genetically engineer more drought-resistant plants or whatnot, but the farmers in rural parts of third-world-countries will suffer, while what's left of their freshwater supplies dry. Once the coral reefs are wiped out from the increased acidification of the oceans, another hundred or so million will starve to death because they rely on food from the ocean.
  - adrianN 10y ago
    Of course, as I said the transition period will be uncomfortable. A few hundred million people dying over a time of a couple of decades is very different from the end of the world though.
    - spraak 10y ago
      Generally I think "the end of the world" is the end of those observing the world (us, humans). So most of the population dying sounds like the end..
    - treehau5 10y ago
      That transition period is unacceptable. It is unacceptable to accept it as an inevitability, and it is unacceptable to view a few hundred million as inconsequential, especially when the tools are present to solve the issue. In my eyes, once we get to the point where our complacency has allowed us to even think in these terms and still be able to sleep comfortably at night, we have already lost (I'm no exception, and this isn't an accusation). We've allowed power to condense to a select few, and we all feel like small fries in the big global stage.
      - adrianN 10y ago
        I agree that we should stop producing GHGs as quickly as possible. I'm just arguing that climate change is not the end of the world. In the same way you can argue that another global war is probably not the end of the world yet we should avoid it by all means.

woliveirajr 10y ago

If the cracking speed continues, it'll brake apart in few weeks. I'm curious if there are projections on where it'll float after it looses connection, given that certainly there are currents in the region, but I don't think that such huge mass wasn't used in drift calculations earlier.

bebop 10y ago
From what I have heard, it sounds like it will spend most of it's time in the South Sea. As it breaks apart smaller chunks can move farther north.

ComradeTaco 10y ago

I honestly believe the US isn't going to have enough political capital or will to do anything about climate change in next 15-20 years. What we will have to do regardless is deal with rising storm surges and sea levels. Pretty much every major city will need a significant storm barriers. We should consider land buy back on easily flooded harbor barriers, and perhaps even abandonment of smaller coastal communities. Unfortunately, the everglades are sunk, and Florida will become increasingly unlivable, as salt water infiltrates almost all groundwater supplies.

jshawl 10y ago
The US President (as of today) thinks climate change is a hoax - https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/265895292191248385?lang=en https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/26589529219124838...
- Retric 10y ago
  Don't assume he is being honest when he says anything. Lying is practically the guys calling card. That said, he is unlikely to push climate change one way or another globally. With how cheap wand and solar has gotten coal is on the way out and would take significant subsides to become competitive.
  - merpnderp 10y ago
    Do you have any evidence it is solar and wind and not natural gas that have been undercutting coal?
    - mulletbum 10y ago
      There is some stuff out there. Check out this article http://bfy.tw/9azA http://bfy.tw/9azA
    - KirinDave 10y ago
      This is an odd request. Everything is undercutting coal. Coal has always been a rather expensive and dangerous technology, it's just that it's plentiful and in the land rights of Western powers. Other forms of energy have been undercutting it since thermal steam rigs started working in North African farms. Probably longer when you consider the history of wind power. If Natural Gas wasn't so arduous to obtain, a carbon liberator, and damaging to the water table to obtain, I suspect we'd be more excited about it.

castis 10y ago

Do we know how tall the walls of that rift are, and/or whether or not the material filling in the gap is at sea level?

scarletham 10y ago
Last I saw, ~300ft wide and ~1700ft deep. https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/rift-in-antarcticas-larsen-c-ice-shelf https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/rift-in-antarcticas-larse...

enlightenedfool 10y ago

Is there a prediction model for the coastal line recession over the next few decades? A map with timelines would be great.

dnm 10y ago
For the USA: https://coast.noaa.gov/slr/ https://coast.noaa.gov/slr/ (Sorry, no timeline, just predictions by feet).

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

neom 10y ago

I believe this is the same crack that we discussed a couple weeks back: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13365211 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13365211

grahamel 10y ago
It is yeah (Larsen C ice shelf)

lolive 10y ago

Trump: "Whassup???" Cthulhu : "Whassup!!! Guess what? I can now attend your president party! There is a massive ice crack just upon R'lyeh :) " Trump: "Global warming FTW \o/ Will you sing the hymn? That would ROOCK!" Cthulhu: "It sure will be a MASSIVE loss of sanity points for everyone!" Trump: "Yep. And that's just the beginning."

bedhead 10y ago

I believe in climate change, however, I'm not sure what the big deal is. It is a natural byproduct of increasing prosperity. Humanity can cope with the effects, and do so with relative ease. As a whole, the world gets better every day. Furthermore, the hyperbole (can extreme hyperbole exist or is that redundant?) that has developed around climate change is deeply troubling to me. The fear mongering and impending doom predictions remind me of religious extremists and worry me greatly. Look no further than comments right here which extrapolate a crack in an ice shelf to literally witnessing the end of the world as we know it. That so many people accept this detached extremism concerns me far more than weird weather patterns or a bunch of beach homes being exposed to storm damage.

bicubic 10y ago
> Humanity can cope with the effects, and do so with relative ease. While humanity will cope in the sense that the species will probably go on existing, the current human population of this planet only exists because a large number of ecological parameters are within the sweet spot. Anything that disrupts global food supply, anything that disrupts fresh water supply, will kill billions of people in a matter of decades. Rising sea levels will displace a moderate percentage of our population and be the catalyst for a new round of wars, but the real danger lies in the fact that we're in the middle of a major extinction event that's increasingly likely to leave most of the population in starvation.
- bedhead 10y ago
  Your mind has been poisoned and I genuinely pity you.
  - Daishiman 10y ago
    So you're here to troll, really. You have a "belief", completely unfounded and unjustified, and you think it's better than what's being understood by science at its pinnacle. Brilliant, really.
jcfrei 10y ago

macu 10y ago

The title of this article is missing a crucial "in 2 weeks" that actually gives meaning to 6 miles. I can't believe how poorly articles are titled. Qualifying information takes a few words.

chrshawkes 10y ago

Is it inappropriate to say there could soon be a good investment opportunity to buy beach houses say, a few blocks back from the beach?

dwaxe 10y ago

That's 9.6 kilometers for you metric folk. Someone has suggested a March breakup for the Ice block. That is the time of the Minimum Ice Extent. I would love to know what the projections are for how long it will take for this iceberg to melt. Imagine what adventures it will have traveling around the world with albatross, turtles and whales for company.

fny 10y ago

By the way, Scientists studying the rift don't attribute this event to climate change: > "This is probably not directly attributable to any warming in the region, although of course the warming won't have helped," says Luckman. "It's probably just simply a natural event that's just been waiting around to happen." [0] [0]: http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/01/16/509565462/an-ice-shelf-is-cracking-in-antarctica-but-not-for-the-reason-you-think http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/01/16/509565462/...

refurb 10y ago
Jesus Christ. 100+ comments with back-and-forth about climate change and the scientist who knows the most doesn't think it has anything to do with the crack.

SpikeDad 10y ago

Fortunately the US has solved that problem. Trump has removed all mentions of climate change from the Whitehouse website thereby fixing the problem.