NASA actually spotted two weirdly rectangular icebergs
Operation IceBridge saw double when it came to geometric icebergs in Antarctica.
Two squared-off icebergs appear in this image, one over to the right and the other above the plane.
The internet got pretty excited over the past week about an oddly squared-off iceberg that sparked talk of everything from aliens to the imposing monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Not satisfied with blowing our minds once, NASA released an image on Monday showing a second rectangular iceberg. The second iceberg is not quite as perfectly angled as the first one, but it still looks like you could decorate it with colorful icing and serve it for a birthday party.
The iceberg photos come from the agency's Operation IceBridge, a long-running aerial survey mission that measures and monitors polar ice.
This monolith-like iceberg turned a lot of heads.
IceBridge senior support scientist Jeremy Harbeck photographed the icebergs. "I often see icebergs with relatively straight edges, but I've not really seen one before with two corners at such right angles like this one had," he says.
The IceBridge team also posted a fun GIF of its plane flying towards the icebergs, which helps put the formations in context with their surroundings.
Wow, it’s been amazing to see what a splash our photo of a tabular Antarctic iceberg, by #IceBridge’s Jeremy Harbeck, has made. Fly toward the berg with @NASAArmstrong's DC-8 forward camera. More: https://t.co/kADuUL455F pic.twitter.com/tm4Rydh8V3
— NASA ICE (@NASA_ICE) October 23, 2018
The icebergs are a particular kind called tabular icebergs, which resemble sheet cakes. The vast majority of their mass is hidden underwater. What we see on the top is just a fraction of the chilly formations.
While the rectangular ice might look a little unreal, they're still just a natural part of the process of icebergs breaking off the Larsen C ice shelf in Antarctica.
