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NASA has discovered a visually-jarring mile-long iceberg that takes the shape of a perfect rectangle.
The iceberg was photographed floating near the Larsen C ice shelf in Antarctica by sea ice specialist Alek Petty. According to Petty, the formation is called a “tabular iceberg” and is not totally uncommon.
“The ice shelves that produce the icebergs are extremely flat and expansive, so we often see nearby tabular icebergs similar to the one seen in the photo,” Brooke Medley, NASA’s Operation IceBridge deputy project scientist, added over email to Mashable.
Tabular icebergs are the products of calving ice shelves—when huge chunks of ice break off—and they’re known for their angular lines and smooth tops.
Via Gizmodo:
In July 2017, Antarctica’s Larsen C ice shelf released the enormous A68 iceberg, which weighs about 1,000 billion tons and occupies an area roughly the size of the state of Delaware. Harbeck and his colleagues were investigating this massive structure when the geometric shape was spotted.
Despite these bad boys being a relatively common thing to ice scientists around the world, the general public is preparing for an alien invasion.
Now excuse me while I lock myself in my alien bunker.
[h/t Mashable]