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But you may be struggling to understand some of the finer details of melting ice, such as the difference between icebergs and ice floe. An iceberg is a large mass of freshwater ice that has broken off of a glacier or an ice shelf. An ice floe is a large, flat pack of floating ice.
Fast ice, or land-fast ice, refers to the large, solid ice sheets that are attached to land. The pack ice consists of the smaller, free-floating pieces of sea ice. They may have formed independently, or may have broken off from the fast ice (Figure 14.1.3). Figure 14.1.3 Fast ice (left) and pack ice (right).
12 wrz 2022 · More highly broken floes permit higher contact between the ice and the ocean, by the simple fact that they move independently, revealing small patches of open water. These small regions reduce total sea ice concentration and permit more sunlight.
Ice floe refers to the basic element of drift ice, characterized by granular ice floes that move on the sea surface as a two-dimensional system. AI generated definition based on: Encyclopedia of Ocean Sciences (Second Edition), 2009
A glacier is different from an ice floe or pack ice. Glaciers are formed on land (on continents), while ice floes and pack ice float on water (in oceans). There are two main types of glacier: ice caps and glaciers dependent on relief.
While it is true that both glaciers and ice floes are large masses of ice that can be found in arctic regions, there is a major difference between them. Basically, glaciers originate on land, and ice floes form in open water and are a form of sea ice.
Together they store a volume of ice that, if completely melted, would cause global sea level to rise by around 65 metres. The ice sheets of West and East Antarctica have a combined ice volume of 26.37 million cubic kilometres, and the inland ice of Greenland around three million cubic kilometres.
