{"id":22782,"date":"2024-04-25T06:39:07","date_gmt":"2024-04-25T01:09:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=22782"},"modified":"2025-04-06T22:01:31","modified_gmt":"2025-04-06T16:31:31","slug":"ross-ice-shelf","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/ross-ice-shelf\/","title":{"rendered":"Key Facts about Ross Ice Shelf"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>About Ross Ice Shelf:<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Location<\/strong>: It is the <strong>largest ice shelf<\/strong> of <strong>Antarctica<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>It is situated in the <strong>Ross Sea<\/strong>, extending off the continent\u2019s coast into the ocean.<\/li>\n<li>It is the <strong>world\u2019s largest floating body of ice<\/strong>, covering approximately <strong>487,000 square kilometres<\/strong>, about the <strong>size of France<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Only ten percent<\/strong> of the ice shelf <strong>is visible,<\/strong> with the <strong>majority hidden<\/strong> in several hundred metres of ice <strong>below the surface<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Thickness<\/strong>: Its thickness varies significantly, ranging from <strong>about 100 meters to several hundred meters. <\/strong>The thickest parts are generally found where the shelf anchors against the continent.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Formation<\/strong>:\n<ul>\n<li>It is formed by the <strong>accumulation and compaction of snow<\/strong>, which, over time, turns into ice.<\/li>\n<li>It is <strong>being fed<\/strong> a constant flow of <strong>ice from glaciersdrainingfrom<\/strong> both the East and West <strong>Antarctic Ice Sheets.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>As new ice is added, existing ice is being removed<\/strong> through melting at the base and ice calving at the front.\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>It plays an important role in <strong>stabilising the Antarctic ice sheet<\/strong>, buttressing the ice that is constantly moving over the land surface.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Key Facts about Ross Sea:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>It is a <strong>giant bay<\/strong> just <strong>320 kms from<\/strong> the <strong>South Pole.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>The sea is <strong>remote<\/strong> and positioned south and slightly <strong>east of New Zealand.\u00a0<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>It is the <strong>largest polar marine ecosystem<\/strong> in the world.<\/li>\n<li>The Ross Sea is <strong>relatively shallow<\/strong>, and it accounts for an area of approximately 960,000 square km (370,000 square miles).\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>A <strong>large portion<\/strong> of the sea is <strong>covered by the Ross Ice Shelf.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>It is strongly <strong>influenced by the coastal East-Wind Drift<\/strong> that sets up a vast clockwise gyre accompanied by <strong>deep water upwelling.\u00a0<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>It is the <strong>first protected area in Antarctica<\/strong> and home to most of the world\u2019s penguins and many species of whale.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Numerous scientific research stations are located along its coasts.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<h3>Q1: What is a Glacier?<\/h3>\n<p>A glacier is a large, perennial accumulation of crystalline ice, snow, rock, sediment, and often liquid water that originates on land and moves down slope under the influence of its own weight and gravity.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Source: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ndtv.com\/science\/ross-ice-shelf-antarcticas-france-sized-ice-shelf-makes-daily-jumps-raising-icequake-concerns-5478464\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><u>Antarctica&#8217;s France-Sized Ice Shelf Makes Daily Jumps, Raising Icequake Concern<\/u><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ross Ice Shelf is the largest ice shelf of Antarctica.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":22783,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-22782","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","8":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22782","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22782"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22782\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22783"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22782"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22782"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22782"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}