Scientists are relying on an underwater robot dubbed Icefin to study Antarctica's rapidly melting Thwaites Glacier. The drone has provided some of the clearest insights into how the iceberg is thinning from below.
. “Instead, this tells us not just how much melting is going on but where and how it’s happening under Thwaites in a very important part of the system.”Schmidt and colleagues from Cornell, New York University, Pennsylvania State University and the British Antarctic Survey operated an underwater robot dubbed Icefin through a nearly 2,000-foot-deep borehole in the ice shelf.
“They’re basically funneling warm water faster than other parts of the glacier system,” Schmidt said. “So, the crevasses are not just weaknesses in terms of cracks in the ice, but they are becoming these giant features, and that process starts right at the grounding line.”Icefin also found long staircase-shaped features known as terraces across the bottom of the ice where significant melting is happening at different angles, she added.
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