Large floating platform of ice caused by glacier flowing onto ocean surface
Not to be confused with Shelf ice or Sea ice.
View of the Larsen Ice Shelf grounding line between Mamelon Point and Hodges Point along the Foyn Coast of the Antarctic Peninsula. The floating ice shelf is in the left foreground, and the grounding line is visible as an abrupt change in surface slope due to flexure caused by the buoyancy force where the ice reaches flotation.
An ice shelf is a large platform of glacial ice floating on the ocean, fed by one or multiple tributary glaciers. Ice shelves form along coastlines where the ice thickness is insufficient to displace the more dense surrounding ocean water. The boundary between the ice shelf (floating) and grounded ice (resting on bedrock or sediment) is referred to as the grounding line; the boundary between the ice shelf and the open ocean (often covered by sea ice) is the ice front or calving front.
Ice shelves are found in Antarctica and the Arctic (Greenland, Northern Canada, and the Russian Arctic), and can range in thickness from about 100–1,000 m (330–3,280 ft). The world's largest ice shelves are the Ross Ice Shelf and the Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf in Antarctica.
The movement of ice shelves is principally driven by gravity-induced pressure from the grounded ice.[1] That flow continually moves ice from the grounding line to the seaward front of the shelf. Typically, a shelf front will extend forward for years or decades between major calving events (calving is the sudden release and breaking away of a mass of ice from a glacier, iceberg, ice front, ice shelf, or crevasse).[2][3] Snow accumulation on the upper surface and melting from the lower surface are also important to the mass balance of an ice shelf. Ice may also accrete onto the underside of the shelf.
The effects of climate change are visible in the changes to the cryosphere, such as reduction in sea ice and ice sheets, and disruption of ice shelves. In the last several decades, glaciologists have observed consistent decreases in ice shelf extent through melt, calving, and complete disintegration of some shelves. Well studied examples include disruptions of the Thwaites Ice Shelf, Larsen Ice Shelf, Filchner–Ronne Ice Shelf (all three in the Antarctic) and the disruption of the Ellesmere Ice Shelf in the Arctic.
^Greve, R.; Blatter, H. (2009). Dynamics of Ice Sheets and Glaciers. Springer. doi:10.1007/978-3-642-03415-2. ISBN 978-3-642-03414-5.
^Glossary of Glacier Terms, Ellin Beltz, 2006. Retrieved July 2009.
^Essentials of Geology, 3rd edition, Stephen Marshak
An iceshelf is a large platform of glacial ice floating on the ocean, fed by one or multiple tributary glaciers. Ice shelves form along coastlines where...
The Ross IceShelf is the largest iceshelf of Antarctica (as of 2013[update], an area of roughly 500,809 square kilometres (193,363 sq mi) and about 800...
The Larsen IceShelf is a long iceshelf in the northwest part of the Weddell Sea, extending along the east coast of the Antarctic Peninsula from Cape...
The Getz IceShelf (74°15′S 125°00′W / 74.250°S 125.000°W / -74.250; -125.000 (Getz IceShelf)) is an iceshelf over 300 nautical miles (560 km; 350 mi)...
or ice disruption. It is the sudden release and breaking away of a mass of ice from a glacier, iceberg, ice front, iceshelf, or crevasse. The ice that...
glacier behind them, while an absence of an iceshelf becomes destabilizing. For instance, when Larsen B iceshelf in the Antarctic Peninsula had collapsed...
About 75% of the coastline of Antarctica is ice shelf. The majority of iceshelf consists of floating ice, and a lesser amount consists of glaciers that...
The Amery IceShelf (69°45′S 71°0′E / 69.750°S 71.000°E / -69.750; 71.000) is a broad iceshelf in Antarctica at the head of Prydz Bay between the Lars...
Shelfice is ice that forms when a portion of a lake surface freezes. It is often then washed upon the shore. The phenomenon is common within the Great...
The Brunt IceShelf borders the Antarctic coast of Coats Land between Dawson-Lambton Glacier and Stancomb-Wills Glacier Tongue. It was named by the UK...
Thwaites IceShelf (75°6′S 105°31′W / 75.100°S 105.517°W / -75.100; -105.517), is an Antarctic iceshelf in the Amundsen Sea. It was named by ACAN after...
Milne IceShelf, a fragment of the former Ellesmere IceShelf, is located in the Qikiqtaaluk Region, Nunavut, Canada. It is the second largest iceshelf in...
marine-based ice sheet, meaning that its bed lies well below sea level and its edges flow into floating ice shelves. The WAIS is bounded by the Ross IceShelf, the...
this nickname is controversial among scientists. The Thwaites IceShelf, a floating iceshelf which braces and restrains the eastern portion of Thwaites...
An iceberg is a piece of freshwater ice more than 15 m long that has broken off a glacier or an iceshelf and is floating freely in open water. Smaller...
Jeffries, Martin O. (March 1986). "Ice Island Calvings and IceShelf Changes, Milne IceShelf and Ayles IceShelf, Ellesmere Island, N.W.T" (PDF). Arctic...
(46 km; 29 mi) wide along the coast of Ellsworth Land, Antarctica. An iceshelf occupies the sound, which is bounded on the west by Smyley Island and...
Gazetteer. The iceshelf areas are listed below, clockwise, starting in the west of East Antarctica: † Indicates that the iceshelf has collapsed. List...
An ice rise is a clearly defined elevation of the otherwise very much flatter iceshelf, typically dome-shaped and rising several hundreds of metres above...
Ice wall is the edge of an iceshelf. It may also refer to: Pimpirev Ice Wall, Livingston Island, Antarctica IceWall SSO, a Web and Federated single sign-on...
Shackleton IceShelf Shackleton IceShelf is an extensive iceshelf fronting the coast of East Antarctica from 95° E to 105° E. It extends for an along-shore...
0°10′W / 70.500°S 0.167°W / -70.500; -0.167 The Fimbul IceShelf is an Antarctic iceshelf about 200 km (120 mi) long and 100 km (60 mi) wide, nourished...
these were the Serson IceShelf, Petersen IceShelf, Milne IceShelf, Ayles IceShelf, Ward Hunt IceShelf, and Markham IceShelf. The smaller pieces continued...
44% of the coast is floating ice in the form of an iceshelf, 38% consists of ice walls that rest on rock, 13% is ice streams or the edge of glaciers...
20th century. The territory lies in West Antarctica, east of the Ross IceShelf and the Ross Sea and south of the Pacific Ocean portion of the Antarctic...
The Markham IceShelf was one of five major ice shelves in Canada, all on the north coast of Ellesmere Island, Nunavut. The iceshelf broke off from the...
period of the North American ice sheet complex, peaking more than 20,000 years ago. This advance included the Cordilleran Ice Sheet, which nucleated in the...
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