Global warming has melted a large number of ice in the arctic and Antarctic. Last news said that as the effect of global warming, hundreds of Antarctic icebergs are floating towards New Zealand in a rare event which has prompted a shipping warning.
An Australian Antarctic Division glaciologist said the ice chunks, spotted by satellite photography, had passed the Auckland Islands and was heading towards the main South Island, about 450 kilometers or about 280 miles northeast.
Scientist Neal Young told AFP that more than 100 icebergs, some measuring more than 200 meters (650 feet) across, were seen in just one cluster, indicating there could be hundreds more. They were the remains of a massive ice floe which split from the Antarctic as sea and air temperatures rise due to global warming.
All of the icebergs have come from a larger one that was probably 30 square kilometers (11.6 square miles) in size when it left Antarctica
The icebergs make a long circuit around Antarctica and the bigger parts of it are breaking up and producing smaller ones. Large numbers of icebergs never floated close to New Zealand since 2006. The first sighting was in 1931 when a number came within 25 kilometers of the coastline.
New Zealand has already issued coastal navigation warnings for the area in the Southern Ocean where the icebergs have been seen. Maritime New Zealand spokesman Ross Henderson say that It is a general warning for shipping in that area to be on the alert for icebergs.
The icebergs are smaller remnants of the giant chunks seen off Australia's Macquarie Island this month, including one estimated at two kilometers (1.2 miles) and another twice the size of Beijing's "Bird's Nest" Olympic Stadium.
More and more icebergs will seen in the area if the Earth's temperature continues to increase and the current trends in global warming were continue.
When icebergs last neared New Zealand in 2006, a sheep was taken by helicopter out to be shorn on one of the floes in publicity stunt by the country's wool industry.
If we let this continued without do something soon we will loose numbers of islands, as the impact of sea level rising. Even a small reduce of the carbon emition could help us to see that islands for longer time.
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