Did you know the biggest iceberg in the world is cruising through the ocean right now? It’s called A23a, and it first broke off the Filchner Ice Shelf way back in 1986! For decades, it was just chilling (literally) in the Weddell Sea, stuck on the seabed. Then it started moving again in 2020, only to get trapped in this oceanic vortex called the Taylor Column. But in December 2024, it finally broke free and is now heading toward South Georgia Island. Oh, and get this — it’s over 4,300 square kilometers in size, which makes it more than three times bigger than New York City!
00:00You're lazing around on the deck of the ship when you see something whitish-gray covering the horizon.
00:06Like in a horror movie or your worst nightmare, this weird fog is nearing the vessel.
00:11It's infinite. You can't see where it starts or where it ends.
00:15Soon it makes the ship look like a grain of sand in a vast desert.
00:19That's when the realization hits.
00:22It's an iceberg, and your ship is likely going to repeat the Titanic's fate.
00:26Now, all this is a very likely scenario, since the world's biggest iceberg, A23A, is on the move again after months of spinning in a huge, wider vortex.
00:37And it's actually the second time in just a couple of years that this massive chunk of ice has broken free.
00:43The first time was in 2023, when the berg went wandering around after being stuck on the seafloor for a staggering 37 years.
00:51The thing is huge, about three times the size of New York City.
00:55It also weighs nearly a trillion tons.
00:58The giant chunk of ice first broke off from Antarctica's Filzner Ice Shelf back in 1986.
01:05But instead of floating away, it got grounded on the seafloor just a few miles from where it started.
01:10Because of that, it melted much more slowly than most icebergs.
01:14In December 2023, A23A finally broke free and started to drift away from Antarctica.
01:21But it didn't get far before getting stuck again.
01:24This time near the South Orkney Islands.
01:27It got trapped in something called a Taylor Column.
01:30That's a huge spinning water current that forms when ocean currents swirl around an underwater mountain.
01:36At one point, A23A was rotating around 15 degrees counterclockwise every day.
01:42Luckily, as of December 2024, the iceberg escaped the Taylor Column and is now slowly moving again.
01:50Researchers are super curious to see if it'll follow the same path as other giant icebergs that have broken off from Antarctica,
01:57or if it'll find its own unique way.
02:01Such enormous icebergs, such as A23A, release nutrients into the water as they melt.
02:07And it can actually create hot spots of life in parts of the ocean that are usually pretty empty.
02:12But there's still a lot we don't understand about how the size, shape, or origin of the iceberg might affect that process.
02:20So, to figure it out, scientists have been collecting water samples from the areas A23A is expected to pass through.
02:28And they'll keep collecting samples as it drifts along.
02:31Hopefully, it'll give us a better idea of how massive icebergs like this one influence the ocean around them.
02:38By the way, the glacier our monster of an iceberg was once part of could be very, very old, literally ancient.
02:46In Antarctica, the oldest glacier ice might be close to 1 million years old.
02:51Over in Greenland, the oldest glacier ice is more than 100,000 years old.
02:55And in Alaska, the oldest glacier ice ever recovered, found in a basin between Mount Bona and Mount Churchill,
03:02is only about 30,000 years old.
03:05A mere child.
03:06At the same time, in a typical Alaskan Valley glacier,
03:10it only takes about 100 years for newly formed ice to travel through the entire length of the glacier.
03:15For something like Bering Glacier, which is Alaska's largest and stretches over 140 miles,
03:21the ice can move through the whole thing in less than 400 years.
03:25And that's a lot of movement for such a massive glacier.
03:28Now, let's move on to Iceberg Alley, a stretch of the Atlantic Ocean that runs from the Arctic to Newfoundland.
03:35If you want to see as many icebergs as you can, that's the place to be.
03:39Tons of icebergs float through this place every year.
03:43Most of them come from Greenland.
03:45In spring and summer, big chunks of glaciers break off
03:48and get carried by north-south currents through Baffin Bay into the Labrador Sea, where they eventually melt.
03:55Some icebergs also come from Canada's shoreline,
03:58traveling through the Davis Strait and into the Labrador Sea,
04:01before drifting along Newfoundland's eastern and western coasts.
04:05These massive ice chunks are really old, too, about 10,000 years.
04:10Every year, about 400 to 800 medium and large icebergs pass through Iceberg Alley.
04:15How fast they drift depends on their size, shape, currents, waves, and wind,
04:21but the average speed is less than a half mile per hour.
04:25Now, there are six types of icebergs that make their way through Iceberg Alley.
04:30Tabular icebergs are flat slabs of ice, much wider than they are tall.
04:35Blocky icebergs have steep sides and sharp angles, like cut-off pyramids.
04:40Wedged icebergs have one steep side and one sloping side.
04:43Dome icebergs have a rounded top.
04:46Pinnacle icebergs have one or more steep peaks sticking up.
04:50And dry dock icebergs are U-shaped, with a hollowed-out section.
04:54They all look incredible.
04:56Comment below which is your favorite type.
05:00Anyway, as these icebergs drift south,
05:02the warmer water speeds up their melting,
05:05making them pretty unpredictable, and sometimes dangerous.
05:08Nowadays, satellites help track medium and large icebergs to prevent accidents.
05:13But smaller icebergs can still be risky for small boats.
05:17One iceberg made headlines in 2018 when it got unusually close to the Newfoundland village of Ferryland.
05:24Pictures of the giant iceberg towering over the village's houses went viral.
05:29It got stuck in the 330-foot deep water, which turned out to be too shallow for its massive size.
05:35And now, I'll take you on an unusual journey to the past
05:39to witness the birth of something beautiful and equally disastrous.
05:43Its very existence led to one of the greatest tragedies in history.
05:47Watch!
05:48An enormous chunk of ice is breaking off a glacier in southwest Greenland.
05:52It's made of snow that fell over 100,000 years ago,
05:55when mammoths were still wandering around the planet.
05:59The enormous iceberg starts its long journey.
06:01It stretches more than 1,700 feet in length and weighs 75 million tons.
06:07Despite its size, it's pretty peaceful.
06:10It stays far away from ships and the busy transport routes near where it was born.
06:15But then, it starts floating south, much farther than most icebergs ever get.
06:21Usually, icebergs like this melt way before they reach such warm waters.
06:25Out of the 15,000 to 30,000 icebergs that drift away from Greenland's glaciers every year,
06:32only about 1% make it all the way to the Atlantic.
06:35So, the fact that this iceberg keeps going
06:38and reaches over 5,000 miles south of the Arctic Circle by April makes it truly unique.
06:44Even after months of melting, this block of ice is still incredibly massive.
06:49It weighs around 1.5 million tons, which is almost twice as much as the Golden Gate Bridge.
06:56Above the water, its visible parts tower more than 100 feet high.
07:01But like most icebergs, the majority of it, about 90%, is hidden below the surface.
07:06The icebergs' story takes a tragic turn on April 14, 1912, when, guess what?
07:14Yep, it comes across the ocean liner Titanic.
07:18The ship is about 370 miles from Newfoundland in the North Atlantic Ocean
07:22when the iceberg seems to appear out of nowhere.
07:25The crew doesn't spot it until just minutes before the crash.
07:29Why don't they see it sooner?
07:31That's a good question.
07:32Now, most people imagine icebergs as tall, bright, white chunks of ice,
07:37maybe even covered with snow.
07:39But in reality, icebergs come in all sorts of colors.
07:43Some are striped, patterned, or even have candy-like swirls.
07:47And they can also be black.
07:49There are two ways an iceberg can turn black.
07:52When the ice is extremely pure, with no bubbles or cracks,
07:55then it absorbs all the light instead of reflecting it, making it look black.
08:00Or a volcanic eruption can cover a glacier in ash.
08:04If ice from that glacier breaks off, it can have a dark or black color.
08:09Scientists still aren't sure why the Titanic's iceberg looked dark.
08:13Or even if it really did.
08:15But one sailor who was on the lookout in the crow's nest said it seemed black.
08:20Another described it as gray or dark gray.
08:23One theory is this iceberg could have been a blackbird,
08:26which forms when the top part melts, causing the iceberg to roll over.
08:31If the bottom is smooth enough to absorb light, it looks dark.
08:35But even if the iceberg wasn't truly black,
08:38nighttime could have made it much harder to spot.
08:41Icebergs don't reflect much light, especially if they're jagged or vertical.
08:46They end up blending into the dark, shimmering ocean.
08:49Without radar, icebergs at night are incredibly hard to see,
08:54which is probably why the Titanic's crew didn't notice it in time.
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