Japan Tsunami has been cutting off parts of Antarctic Icebergs

Last update: August 9, 2011 at 10:47 pm by By Armand Vervaeck

Using satellite radar data, scientists recently observed the calving of several large icebergs from the Sulzberger Ice Shelf along the Antarctic coast as a result of the March 2011 tsunami half a world away in Japan.
Scientists have long speculated that ocean waves could cause an ice shelf to flex and break, but this is the first time researchers have observed a tsunami having this effect.

The images above were acquired by the Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar (ASAR) on the European Space Agency’s Envisat satellite on March 11 and 16, 2011. The top image was taken just before the arrival of the tsunami at the front of the Sulzberger Ice Shelf, while the bottom image shows the chunks of ice well out to sea just five days later.
This time-lapse series of images shows the progression of the ice breakup. In each radar image—which allows researchers to see through cloud cover—land ice, ice shelves, and the new bergs are brighter white, while grayer areas have smaller bits of sea ice. Open water is black.

to see the photographs and read more, go to:    http://earthquake-report.com/2011/08/09/japan-tsunami-has-been-cutting-off-parts-of-antarctic-icebergs/