The largest bandage in the world is trapped

In nearly a trillion tons, A23A stopped moving off the southern Island of Georgia, the overseas British territory in the South Atlantic, according to the announcement on March 3 of the Antarctic Survey Agency (BAS). The ice mountain spreads on the area of ​​3,672 km2 when measured in August 2024, only slightly smaller than Rhode Island and is twice as much as London’s area. It separated from the Filchner ice shelf in Antarctica in 1986, then trapped at the sea floor of Weddell Sea for more than 30 years, according to CNN.

In 2020, A23A began to drift along the ocean currents, but at the end of 2024, it was trapped for months, turning around a mountain under the sea, delaying the journey to the North. After it escapes, experts are concerned that A23A will go south of Georgia, blocking the access to the seal and penguin to reproduce on the island. But this concern softened when the ice mountain seemed to stranded on the continental shelf about 90 km from the shore. “If the ice is stranded, we think it will not affect the wild life in South Georgia,” Andrew Meijers, an oceanor in Bas.

In contrast, its appearance can bring some benefits to wildlife. According to Meijers, the nutrient is stirred by the stranded and melting event of A23A can increase the amount of food available for the entire ecosystem in the region, including seals and penguins.

Although A23A currently retains the structure, in the recent decades, the large ice mountains drifted along this route will quickly break, scattered and melted. “It is likely that it will be broken due to the increase in pressure, but this cannot be predicted,” Meijers said.

When A23A is broken, the smaller ice mountains that it creates will threaten fish and maritime fishing because they are more difficult to detect and monitor. Scientists say this ice mountain can be separated as part of the natural development cycle of the ice shelf, not due to the climate crisis due to fossil fuel. But the global warming is leading to many worrying changes in Antarctica with many serious consequences for sea level.