ice shelf

noun

Definition of ice shelf

: shelf ice In 2002, a Rhode Island-size section of an ice shelf crumbled into the sea.— Joe McGowan

Examples of ice shelf in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

There’s no way to know what an iceberg of this size will do to the ice shelf. — Avery Thompson, Popular Mechanics, "An Iceberg Twice the Size of New York City Is Poised to Break Off Antarctica," 26 Feb. 2019 At this point, the ice becomes disconnected from the ground and turns into a kind of floating ledge, known as an ice shelf, that juts out into the ocean from the front of the glacier. — Chelsea Harvey, Scientific American, "New Maps Show How Greenland’s Ice Sheet Is Melting from the Bottom Up," 6 Nov. 2017 The continent is rapidly melting, and a large chunk of the snow and ice is held back from the ocean only by an array of glaciers and ice shelves guarding the coasts. — Avery Thompson, Popular Mechanics, "NASA Found a Giant Underground Cavern in Antarctica Almost the Size of Manhattan," 31 Jan. 2019 Their findings will provide a snapshot of what life under the ice shelf was like, so that changes to the ecosystem can be tracked. — Doyle Rice, USA TODAY, "Scientists to explore an underwater world near Antarctica that's been hidden for 120,000 years," 13 Feb. 2018 In the past, these flights have mapped Greenland’s ice sheets, identified collapsing ice shelves, and spotted mysterious holes in the Antarctic ice. — Avery Thompson, Popular Mechanics, "NASA Spots Strange Rectangular Iceberg in Antarctica," 23 Oct. 2018 Antarctica's largest ice shelf, the Ross Shelf is named after James Clark Ross, a British explorer famed for his expedition to the continent in the 19th century. — David Grossman, Popular Mechanics, "Antarctic Wind Creates a Dramatic Humming Noise On The Ross Ice Shelf," 17 Oct. 2018 And then the really tough place to make measurements is underneath the floating ice shelf, underneath this thick plate of ice. — Andrea Thompson, Scientific American, "Antarctic Quest Seeks to Predict the Fate of a Linchpin Glacier," 14 May 2018 Scientists also hope to learn whether the ice shelf has melted in the past due to other climate shifts. — Sophie Weiner, Popular Mechanics, "The Ross Ice Shelf is Freezing, Not Melting. Which Is Weird.," 23 Feb. 2018

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