Climate: a huge iceberg breaks out of Antarctica, near a British station

An iceberg the size of the agglomerations of Paris or London has broken off from Antarctica, not far from a British research station which has long feared events of this nature in the area, British scientists said.

The block of ice, which is nearly 1,270 square kilometers, broke away from the rest of the pack ice early Friday morning, according to data collected by British instruments installed near the station.

No human life is threatened, since the 12 people who worked so far in the Halley VI station, located less than 20 kilometers from the rupture zone, were evacuated in mid-February by plane, said in a statement the British Antarctic Survey (BAS), research organization on the polar areas which exploits the place.

"Our teams have been prepared for years for an iceberg to detach from the Brunt ice shelf," said Jane Francis, director of BAS, the teams monitoring "daily" the advance of the faults thanks to "a network automated high-precision GPS instrumentation around the station ”.

"Either the iceberg will move away, or it will run aground and stay"

This data, then sent to the University of Cambridge for analysis, made it possible to give the alert on Friday without anyone being on site.

Already in 2017, the BAS had decided to reduce the presence in this station built in 2012 and move it a few kilometers, fearing that it would end up on a drifting iceberg, following the melting of the ice.

A "wise decision", now believes Simon Garrod, director of operations at BAS.

"Our job now is to closely monitor the situation and assess any potential impact of this detachment on the remaining ice shelf," he added.

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Several scenarios are now possible for the months to come: "either the iceberg will move away, or it will run aground and stay" nearby, said Ms. Francis.

The teams are not coming back anytime soon, as the station remains closed for the remainder of the Arctic winter.