Dancing in the ocean whirlpool

The world’s largest iceberg is stuck in the Arctic Ocean

The world's largest iceberg, A23a, is currently stuck in a huge vortex of water in the Southern Ocean and has been turning on itself for months.

(Bild: APA/AFP/EYOS Expeditions/Richard Sidey)

What is currently the world's largest iceberg is probably stuck in a huge whirlpool. The colossus, known as A23a, has been spinning around itself in the Southern Ocean for months, as satellite images show. The iceberg may not be able to escape the so-called Taylor column for years. 

However, this also prevents the colossus from reaching warmer climes carried by ocean currents and melting more quickly. "A23a is the iceberg that simply refuses to die," the BBC quotes polar expert Mark Brandon from the Open University.

Turns about 15 degrees a day
A23a broke away from the Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf in the Antarctic in 1986, but remained stuck to the seabed for decades. After breaking away in 2000, it temporarily went on a kind of spurt - only to remain in one place again.

Close to the South Orkney Islands to the north-east of the Antarctic Peninsula, it rotates around 15 degrees counter-clockwise every day, as the British Antarctic Survey polar research institute announced on Platform X. A23a therefore needs 24 days to complete one round.

4.5 times the size of Berlin
The iceberg is around 4000 square kilometers in size, around 4.5 times the size of Berlin. In the meantime, waves and weathering have carved huge arches and cave-like depressions into the colossus, as images from a ship belonging to the company Eyos Expeditions from mid-January show.

According to the European Space Agency Esa, icebergs from the so-called Weddell sector usually end up in the South Atlantic and melt away.