A giant ice sheet, nearly four times the size of New York, broke off Antarctica into the Weddell Sea, becoming the largest iceberg in the world, according to the European Space Agency.
The new iceberg, named A-76 by scientists, was seen in the latest satellite images captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-1 mission, the space agency said in a statement posted on its website accompanied by a photo of the layer. ice.
The total area of ??the iceberg is 4,320 square kilometers and measures 175 kilometers long and 25 kilometers wide. The large size of the A-76, which broke off the Ronne ice shelf, ranks it as the largest iceberg existing on the planet - surpassing the A-23A, which is about 3,380 square kilometers and is also located on the Weddell Sea.
Such detachments are part of a natural cycle, but some ice blocks have been detached very often in recent years, a phenomenon that scientists associate with climate change.
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Burimet: Guardian, European Space Agency